letter 019: polka-dot
dear junk mail club,
my new song “polka-dot” is out now everywhere! you can listen to it here :)
this song was a great collaboration and team effort between two lifelong friends, Postcard Boy and carwash. both artists are extremely stubborn and butted heads throughout the process of making “polka-dot,” but are proud of where the song ended up and have grown closer because of it. however, in classic carwash fashion, he opted out of being in the music video, which you can watch now.
under a firework filled sky, two summers ago, the idea for this song came about. it was the fourth of july, and chris and i had recently become friends. i don’t remember the time exactly, but chris reminded me of this story last week. as it goes, we chose not to go out anywhere for the fourth and instead stayed in, trying to make music together for the first time. we let the record button run, and fiddled around with some pedals and an old synth on the floor of my room. you twist knobs and act like you know what they might do. eventually, you do actually learn what they mean, but not us, at the time — and that naivety is quite fun because you get surprised more often. out of guided luck, we landed on the alarming sound that starts the song and provides the foundation for the rest of the track to build around. i exported that singular sound for you to listen to below.
when you are making music with someone for the first time, there is this dance you do of not wanting to overstep onto the other person’s ideas, letting their intuition fill in the gaps of your own, and every so often you’ll align for a moment and it will lead you to find a new sound you love. i remember us geeking on how gritty that original synth sounded, and that sparked us to continue to making a whole song out of it.
since, chris and i have become super close friends. as i reflect on it, i’m just now growing aware of how important a role this song played in us hanging out more often. i hadn’t thought back to those early days in a long while. there’s a strong sense of belief and drive, but also childlike enthusiasm that chris has that i admire. and his energy provided a lot of motivation for me to keep working towards this next project. i’m happy this song exists as a timestamp for us as the beginning of what will be a life full of shooting in the dark and seeing what ideas come to fruition.
i wanted to also say a specific and special thank you to the crew of new and old friends that made this most recent video possible — repeatedly playing fifty two card pick up with me as we dropped hundreds of envelopes from the ceiling to make the ideas come to life, lifting and using all our buff strength to deflate the mailbox bouncy house like a glorified blow up mattress, taylor for sourcing plants, bobby for building the perfect mailbox stands, and the many more things that are never shown in the final cut. none of the ideas would exist in the world without your help. thank you.
i’m feeling nervous, but eagerly excited to return with postcard boy now for the first time since 2020. it feels so wholesome to be back. this song is the first of a greater something that i’ll speak on soon. :)
hope this finds you well,
garry