boy blugh blog
RAC - BOY
This is the first album I ever heard from RAC, the producer / artist from Portland, Oregon. I don’t remember how I came across RAC, but in October 2020 I put this album on my list and I’m happy I did!
By the way, his website is so fucking cool, and I think this level of care and intention is a through-line in everything I’ve seen RAC do. Check it out!
https://rac.fm
The best thing about this album for me is by far the sound QUALITY of the music. The crafting of sound (timbre, texture, instrumentation, processing, etc) is fantastic. You know you’re in for a “sound-conscious” album when it opens with a short, relatively ambient/drum-less instrumental track. The effects and the mix and all of these parts of music production that are always present but we may not explicitly “hear” are done at such a high level.
For example, check out that spring verb/delay thing on the snap / clap during the break in the vocals:
So cool right?
Oh what’s that? You noticed that the lyrics are emotional and the music is groovy, pretty, and vibey? Me too!
A lot of the lyrics have this general indie love song thing (heartbreak, breakup, flirting, love letter), and the music always compliments the story of the song, even if there is a contrast as in the boomerang example where the music kind of has this Motown bounce with diatonic major chords but the lyrics are pretty depressing.
In a very vague way, this album sounds young, cute, sensitive, imaginative, emotional, and personal. I think I could describe every song with these words.
This brings me to the next thing about this album I wanted to talk about. The album is full of features of different artists, and the producer is the glue behind it all. This is the opposite of the common format of the artist being the focus while several different producers contribute. What’s awesome about this album is that despite 14 of the 18 songs being features with different artists, the album achieves a continuity and consistency that I find to be relatively rare.
listened: March’22
saved; October’20
released: 2020
Above are the notes from the listen. A highlight for me is “Sweater”, which just oozes this cozy-cute feeling. My favorite part is the bridge where she sings “that’s what I like” landing on the major 7.
“Arcoiris” guitar melody brings me back to the pop-punk melodies of middle school, and then drops into this half-step harmonic oscillation that adds so much dimension in such a simple way. I called it a “mini-tune” because it kind of reminds me of the work by composer Tim Kiefer, who does all the music for Adventure Time, and these compositions are often short but very effective at storytelling.
Bottom line is this music is crafted really well. I don’t necessarily gravitate towards music that feels like this and I really enjoyed the listen. I hope you do too!
Happy listening!
