BEHIND THE TRACKS

I wanted the look and aesthetic for INFRARED to be based directly off of an emo look, kinda like a return to form. Emo culture and emo music will forever have a place in my heart as I grew up with a lot of it and found it so interesting as a kid. The instrumentals and music videos, the fashion, the expression. My main inspiration being Matt Good and Sonny Moore from the band “From First to Last”. The red eye paint look is directly inspired from a look Matt Good did during the early FFTL era.

Originally the cover art was going to be a screenshot from the “How To Draw” music video where I had that look, but I ended up going with the drawing cover art. The drawing is drawn by me, the background drawings being based on a nightmare I had. Probably my most haunting nightmare ever.

A lot of the times when I have nightmares I would try to remember them as best as I could and write them down as I tend to forget them after a bit. This one specific nightmare was so dark that I told my girlfriend about it immediately and then decided to sketch it out on paper as a way to show her exactly what I had seen. After that I ended up just putting together a collage of sketches and taking a picture of it, giving me the INFRARED cover art.

In terms of the EP itself, I just wanted to go back to my experimental stuff. I fell in love with the music I would listen to when I was like 14 again. Not even just emo music though, but old SoundCloud stuff. I got into doom scrolling SoundCloud again recently and listening to some of my favorite songs from the 2000s up to the 2014-2017 SoundCloud era.

Also, I felt as if during the SKIN TURNS RED rollout a lot of my listeners expected the album to include harder hitting trap songs, some stuff they could turn up to, as I was promoting some songs of that caliber on the STR promotional SoundCloud account. So I wanted to serve that to them.

Unfortunately around the time of making SKIN TURNS RED I felt as if I had a specific audience to cater to then and I just wanted to put out something digestible and easy to listen to. Now I honestly don’t give a fuck and I’ll make what I want to make no matter how anyone feels about it. It’s my art and my form of expression.

On the tape there’s production from some of my friends, Lewis and Tepa, as well as a song produced by me since I got much into self production recently. Overall I just wanted to put together something that I enjoyed that also was able to please the different corners of my audience.

I know SKIN TURNS RED felt strictly like an R&B album, considering around that time that was what music I was stuck on, but I feel like INFRARED feels less polished and more fun, like a roller coaster of emotions, which is what people tapped into my music for in the first place.

Whether that feeling is high energy or complete despair. I think that’s what the people want. The eight tracks will tell if I’m right or not.

I made “Love Me Less” directly after an argument with my girlfriend. It was over my reliance on smoking to avoid dealing with my emotions or actually working things out. Sometimes I think I don’t deserve her even though she tells me all the time I do.

This song feels like something I would have made during the Loser era, even though I dislike that era a lot. I know a lot of people are fond of it so it’s whatever. Originally “BRAT” was gonna be the opening track for INFRARED, but I felt it didn’t match what I wanted this EP to truly be. It didn’t feel opener worthy.

“Love Me Less” immediately hits you when it plays and I think that’s exactly what this tape needs: immediate emotion. The main chorus is inspired by the song “Cashin Out” by From First to Last from the “Throne to the Wolves” album.

This album was the band’s second released album following Sonny Moore, aka Skrillex, leaving the band and Matt Good leading. A lot of people fell out with FFTL when Sonny left but honestly I’ve come to prefer Matt as the main vocalist. The song is about artists who abandon their roots for money and go towards a commercialized sound because they feel like they have to. I somewhat relate to that with my music and I just love the song and that album.

If I remember correctly I made this song at like 6am when I had got in the habit of not recording anything for a while. I just remember wanting to try out a different sound and just making something fun.

Also if I’m being honest this song was a diss track, but by the time I had decided to put the song on the tape the beef was settled, so I won’t hash out the details on who it was about.

Anyways, I actually started the song with the second half of the track and worked backwards from there, then mixed it like it was in a DJ set or something with many sound effects and random little audio clips. That’s something I honestly always did when it comes to my music because I always hated when a song sounded too boring, which is probably why SKIN TURNS RED didn’t hit for everybody who had listened to my stuff prior.

I added a random audio clip from the TV show “TED”. I love that show. It’s funny as hell and I love Seth MacFarlane. Scott Grimes too. I watch American Dad damn near every single day.

Back on topic though, this song was just dumb fun to put together and I wouldn’t mind making more like it. I also got an animated video done for it which made me love the song even more. Shoutout Shethead for the video, the look of it reminds me of the animations from the YouTube channel “How It Should Have Ended” that I would always watch as a kid.

“Krueger” was probably the last song added to the tape. Me and the bros from the collective we made, FNNMILITIA, were in call cooking up beats and I made the beat for “Krueger” and recorded on it. I instantly fell in love with it and threw it on the tape because why the fuck not. I loved it and it was produced by me, win win.

When I was recording the first bar I was deadass watching a video on the Nightmare on Elm Street 2010 reboot so the Freddy Krueger bar came in mind. Also it worked out because I had a Freddy glove that my homie John gave me last Halloween, so shoutout to him. Most of this song was just me punching in so it was effortless and fun.

At first I was gonna have a feature on the song, that feature being imsg, but I decided to go no features for the tape. He did end up doing his verse live in call though so if anyone ever wanted to hear it I have it. It’s hard as hell.

I made “OHOH” like a day after I made “FOREIGN” because I wanted to make more tracks like it. This song came so naturally. I remember the recording process being super smooth and it came out so perfect after I mixed it.

The only issue is I had nothing recorded on the beat drop for months. At first I was just gonna find someone to feature on the song and fill that spot. I was thinking Zai or Killjae, but unfortunately they didn’t get on it in time and I had ended up deciding to go no feats anyways.

So one day I said fuck it and recorded on the beat drop. I was just struggling to figure out how to go about it, but at the time of recording it I was completely home alone and had pulled an all nighter to fix my sleep schedule so I had decent energy.

I wrote some shit, recorded like 30 takes because I couldn’t get the mix perfect at first, finished it, showed the bros in call and it was done. The name itself is based on my other name I came up with, “osohaunted”. I guess that name is considered as my little producer alias and I just liked the username so aye.

This is probably my most aggressive song to date. I knew I needed a song like this on the tape because a lot of people enjoyed songs that I made similar to this sound during the SKIN TURNS RED rollout like “SMD” and “MANDY MUSE”.

The song is heavily X inspired if that wasn’t obvious. X has been one of my main musical influences for a while. I say musical because even though he had some good stuff, I’m aware the guy did some pretty terrible shit I can’t stand behind.

Also I say all the time I lowkey can’t listen to any X song after like 2017. They slick make me cringe. I’ll know the words for sure, no doubt, but I’d rather just not hear them. This song was fun as fuck to make though.

Lewis sent me the beat and I hopped on it right away. Originally the song was short as fuck, so I ended up just looping it to extend it because my throat was sore from screaming on it.

Oh and some parts of the song were inspired by a Zai song I was listening to hella at the time, so shoutout the bro. He’s deadass going up crazy right now. I’m so proud of him. Overall just a high energy track that I wanted to throw on the tape. Not sure if the song will be favored because the lyrics are so raunchy and outta pocket, but I truly don’t give a fuck, not gon lie.

This song is a special one. I had recorded on two beats produced by my homie Tepa, “Oh Dear” and “Princess and the Frog”. I dropped both songs in a SoundCloud mix but I kept privating the track because I wasn’t sure if I wanted them on the tape or not, especially “Princess and the Frog”.

Plus people were telling me to extend “Princess and the Frog” so I did. The song is obviously based on the movie Princess and the Frog, a movie me and my girlfriend both enjoy together. The lyrics itself is just a lot of my thoughts and my relationship situations put into vague words.

I won’t get too deep into it but I think the song is beautiful and I felt it needed to be added to the tape as it was the only track that had a feel of SKIN TURNS RED in it. Still wanted to cater to the people who wanted more of the STR sound so it works out.

I also like the double meaning that comes to my mind when I think of Princess and the Frog. The struggling pretty princess who just wants to make her way but is constantly being dragged down by a not so attractive thing with its own issues. Not saying that’s directly how I view myself but sometimes I get in my head that way. Amazing movie by the way.

This is probably one of my favorites from this tape. One day Lewis had sent me a beat and it sampled one of my favorite songs of all time, “Mirrors” by Justin Timberlake, one of the only 9 minute songs I can listen to in full with no complaints.

When I first heard that shit it was like euphoria and I hopped on it immediately. I was first gonna do singing on the whole song but I felt like rapping hit harder. The second half of the song where I do song is inspired by the song “7AM” by Lil Uzi Vert.

Like I said I was listening to a lot of old SoundCloud classics so that song popped into my mind. Also, this song was gonna have a feature as well, my brother Ripidols. He recorded on it and originally I was gonna drop it on my osohaunted SoundCloud account but I decided it was too good to be a throwaway.

But like I said I decided to go no feats, but I wouldn’t mind dropping the versions with features later on in the future. Originally there was no transition from the prior track to this track either, but I had Lewis add a little intro to the beat so I could do a transition. Came out perfect, he snapped and he’s such an underrated producer.

This was always gonna be the final track. I made this song the start of the year when Tepa sent me the beat. Bro loved it so much he played it like 100 times and it made me love it even more. Really I was just going through it recording this song. Fed up with everything.

I was having a convo with my girlfriend about the current state of the world. The fact our president and all the higher ups are pedophiles and rapists, bunch of injustice surrounding the news, I don’t know just talks that shouldn’t even have to come out of anybody’s mouth.

I’m not the most political person in the world but it’s not hard to see that the world is completely corrupt and it’s damn near hell for any upcoming adult in these times. I’m not necessarily a spokesperson for this type of shit but it’s just what was on my mind.

A simple song can say a lot and that’s what I wanted to make, something straight forward and heavy hitting. I don’t know if it’ll have much of an impact towards anything but I’m glad I’m able to make what I make at the end of the day.