I used to love, and I mean love Rex Orange County. He was my absolute shit in high school, I used to ride around in my hunk o' junk Volvo (she was the best car I've ever had and will ever have) blasting "Never Enough" and "4 Seasons" out of those dusty, crackling speakers like they were the national anthem. But as with all good things, eventually the rest of the internet got to him, misconstruing and misunderstanding the lyrics, blowing up and overplaying his songs to the point that I began to reject his music and move away from it all. But when the virtual feeding frenzy eventually subsided after they found out that Rex does not in fact just make bubbly bedroom pop songs like "Sunflower" and "Best Friend," I was finally able to look back at the music I'd left behind and wonder why I'd ever stopped listening to him in the first place.
I think what drew a lot of us to Rex Orange County, especially those of us that were 15 or 16 when his first albums came out, was that he stood out as a pretty solid representation of the uncertainties of growing up, graduating, just figuring it all out. He wasn't even 19 years old when Apricot Princess started blowing up, or when "Sunflower" became a staple in indie-centric playlists across the world. He was just a kid, just Alex O'Connor, singing about the seemingly unattainable fantasy of growing up and "gettin' the hell out of this town," about the pressures of making your parents proud, about coming to understand your own emotional spectrum. They were some real heavy handed tunes to listen to during third period math, but I think that was part of the experience. Rex Orange County gave those youthful feelings of existential dread and fear for the future an oddly soothing voice and a twinkly piano soundtrack, and all of a sudden, none of it seemed so scary.
It was a moment, y'know? I can't speak for everyone, of course, but I think for a lot of us fledgling audiophiles, having been raised on our parents' mix CD's and the recession radio pop of the 2000's and early 2010's, Rex Orange County was a key figure in the conversation of what popular music was becoming, and what 'good' or 'real' music could and should be. He was part of an all-star squad of exploding artists beginning to define the sound of the generation; Frank Ocean, Tyler, The Creator, Kali Uchis, The 1975, Mac DeMarco, Clairo-- not to mention, Rex's double appearance on Tyler, The Creator's Flower Boy skyrocketed him to further mainstream success and critical recognition.
After four albums of emotional self-help tips and pining for a future that never gets any more attainable, O'Connor began teasing the release of a fifth album in late February, posting on his Instagram a less than cryptic picture of himself posed in front of the legendary Abbey Road Studios in London. Days later, he checked in from Milan, Italy, uploading a string of photos from his time during Milan Fashion Week. Since his European holiday, he's taken a break from social media, remaining secretive about future or current projects, that is, until July 1, when he finally took to Instagram to announce a then untitled fifth album. With a finish line finally in sight, fans lit up the comment section with a wide array of emotion, from disgruntled impatience to unchainable excitement. Over the following weeks, O'Connor uploaded three more cryptic posts to his social media, a collection of photos and clips, before announcing the release of a new single, "Guitar Song," set for Thursday, July 18.
While fans were only expecting the one track, O'Connor far exceed expectations, finally revealing the tentative fifth album's title, The Alexander Technique, slated for a September 6 release, as well as the full 16-song tracklist. Recognizing that's a long time for fans to wait for an album they've already waited two years for, the aforementioned "Guitar Song" was instead uploaded as a double single alongside the album's introductory track, "Alexander." While these two singles alone are hardly indicative of the direction for the entire record, as fans have painstakingly come to learn from previous Rex Orange County singles, "Alexander" and "Guitar Song" are poignant introductions to this familiar new direction in O'Connor's sound.
"Alexander," a sleepy, Randy Newman-esque piano ballad, should come as no surprise for longtime fans, as no Rex album is really complete without one; even the orchestral, radio-friendly bubbliness of 2022's WHO CARES? couldn't prevent the signature Rex melancholy from peeking through on "ONE IN A MILLION." But "Alexander" stands tall against even the heaviest of Rex Orange County's ballad-centric discography (and is also my personal favorite of the two new tracks), in which he recounts a recent trip to the doctor for advice regarding his chronic back pain. The doctor reveals to him that while he may have only been in to find relief or referral for his back, there may be more prevalent issues that he has to deal with that may be exacerbating the issue. O'Connor bitterly shrugs off the notion, but as he retraces the steps of his frustrating and seemingly unaccommodating consultation, he realizes that he "may be using [his] back pain to distract from the pain of life."
Subsequently, "Guitar Song," a song that is exactly that and more, lead in by O'Connor's impassioned acoustic guitar and quickly joined by a simple bass guitar and a host of several woodwind and brass instruments in the background to fill out the overall instrumental. It's a quick Rex standard fueled by feelings of nostalgia, reminiscent of a time when the East Hampshire native wasn't so secure in his image and was still grappling with feeling comfortable in his own skin. He thinks back on his time in San Francisco, feeling homesick and out of place, comparing himself to the hedonistic California lifestyle that permeated from the people around him. He would wonder tirelessly how he could match strides, fighting through suicidal thoughts and self loathing, but would only realize with time that “though, [he] can go compare myself to them, it doesn’t help [him] much in the end.”
Though O’Connor has always dealt with more mature themes in his music, these first few offerings from The Alexander Technique give listeners a peek into the complex new feelings of a a more grown up Rex Orange County; a Rex dealing with the same grown-up feelings and problems as many of his early fans. And while he’ll always be the little whistling Englishman with a buzzcut to me, he’s become an artist that wears maturity quite well.
Rob Lucchesi
Rex Orange County
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