Many of us can link a certain album to pivotal moments in our lives. Whether it’s the first record you bought with your own money, the chord you first learnt to play on guitar, the song that soundtracked your first kiss, the album that got you those awkward and painful pubescent years or the one that set off light bulbs in your brain and inspired you to take a big leap of faith into the unknown – music is often the catalyst for change in our lives and can even help shape who we become.
In this Love Letter To A Record series, Music Feeds asks artists to reflect on their relationship with music and share with us stories about the effect music has had on their lives.
Peach Tree Rascals – Frank Ocean, ‘Channel Orange’ (2012)
As a group with different musical and ethnic backgrounds, it’s rare that we collectively find music that impacts all of us in the same way.
When Channel Orange dropped, we weren’t a group yet but were actively making music out of the shed in Dom’s backyard. The day of the drop we sat in the makeshift studio and stayed in a trance. The air was so hot and sticky, but we were in such shock we remained all day. The musicality and writing Frank presented was nothing we had heard before.
After hearing Channel Orange, the level of complexity and artistry Frank showed was enough to make us realize that we wanted to be artists that break boundaries. Whether it’s genre, lyrically, etc. Frank’s record made it clear that you don’t have to make music for the industry – you can make music for yourself that fans will love because they know it’s unequivocally you.
Our band motto is “never stop being in yourself.” We’d like to believe that this stems from this moment we sat down and listened to this record. So thank you, Frank. You’ve inspired us to push boundaries. We aren’t a genre. We don’t have to talk about one topic. If you believe in yourself, others will discover and love you too.
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Listen to Peach Tree Rascals’ latest hit single, Mariposa, here.
