New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Like a snapshot kaleidoscope of the human experience, the spellbinding "Kids Like Us" music video for alt-pop band THE GRAHAMS flashes by in a whirlwind of colors, emotions, and locales. The shoot for the video (which premiered on Bandsintown yesterday) came together in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the caveat that some of the scenes would need to be shot by the band, Alyssa and Doug Graham, while quarantined. They then teamed up with local Nashville director Preston Leatherman (The 254 Collective) who interlaced their videos with some cinematic found footage, providing a sense of connection amid the chaos of these isolating times.
Taken from their new album KIDS LIKE US (released on March 27, 2020 via 3 Sirens
Music Group/RED MUSIC/The Orchard), the track channels
Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young, emphasizing a break away from the constrictions of family, economy, and society on the fringes of a dead-end town. Like Springsteen, the Grahams both grew up in New Jersey and filter their experiences through these localized lenses. The band explained to Culture Collide (who premiered the audio in March), "'Kids Like Us' explores growing up and living in towns that are now simultaneously confronting climate crisis and environmental damage, opioid epidemics, underemployment, and an entire country on the brink of madness." Adding, "Overall, we were experiencing a need to break free from politics, from the hatred, from adulthood, from the constant clamor and disappointment, from the Nashville scene, from preconceived notions of who we were, and from the artistic constraints we felt in the past."
The irony of it all isn't lost on The Grahams - This track/video came off of an album that started as a way to write about angst and escapism but ultimately developed into one they hope will bring people together. The album release, however, happened just one week after the COVID-19 self-isolation protocols went into effect in America.
As with their previous two albums, 2013 debut, Riverman's Daughter, and 2015's Glory Bound, The Grahams set out for parts unknown to gain inspiration for writing this ambitious new record - this time on a beguiling motorcycle ride along Route 66, at the height of the 2016 election season. "Everything about Route 66 - the neon signs, the motels, the cars, the souvenirs, even the menus - are stuck in a different time," Alyssa says. "Of course the music that developed would have moments of fantasy, moments of horror, even some moments of the supernatural." The resulting album embraces the American Songbook and invokes a musical timewarp when Brian Wilson, Nancy Sinatra, Dusty Springfield, The
Ronettes and
Diana Ross & The Supremes ruled the airwaves. With all of this wrapped up in the neon energy of a
David Lynchian sheen, Kids Like Us proves to be a tour de force that plays out like a work of cinema with peaks, valleys, and, more importantly, a sense of wonder.
Kids Like Us sees The Grahams in new form, exploring balmy and graceful dream pop, 50's mod influenced garage-rock energy, 60's style groovy guitars, all with an explosive Morricone-esque cinematic intrigue. The two producers on the album, Producer-legend Richard Swift (former member of The
Shins who worked with
Damien Jurado,
Nathaniel Rateliff, Lucius, Lonnie Holley, The Mynabirds, Cayucas, Guster, and many more) and Co-Producer Dan Molad (Lucius,
Elizabeth & the Catapult, The Wild Reeds), who later took over the project, enabled The Grahams to channel all that chaotic stimulus into something big, lush, ambitious, and profoundly satisfying. Kids Like Us was Swift's last project before his death in 2018, and the duo was honored to have the chance to work with him.
The Grahams is Alyssa and Doug Graham. Kids Like Us is available now via 3 Sirens
Music Group/RED MUSIC/The Orchard.
