Track Three: Radar
gonna begin this tell all by talking about my current status. i’m not doing so well, but i’m pushing myself to stay consistent with wavy wednesdays because it’s important to me and my greater plan. i’m currently battling heartache and a chest infection, which, honestly, are one in the same. i’m just experiencing a physical manifestation of emotional turbulence to assist in the purging that’s required to move forward. my brain is a bit foggy from my immune system using all my energy. so, this tell all might be all over the place.
i first tried to write this tell all backwards… but yaknow, pivoting is 90% of being a creative… so let’s try it from the top. this song is the oldest song on the album. it was written back when i was recording in garageband on my phone. i ended up taking the lyrics and reworking them around the time i wrote critical damage. additionally, radar was the only song on Baby’s First that didn’t have a vision for the end result. i had previously worked with garrett, with great results i might add, and trusted that he would do the song’s visuals right. unfortunately, i think that my meaning behind the song was not communicated well (my fault) and we were on different pages conceptually. this caused some issues down the line, but nothing we couldn’t handle.
contrary to what chango and san might tell you the lyric is not “make someone nice” it’s
“make some more noise”
the first shoot went beautifully, we shot at avenir cine with the help of stacey vanblarcom as a dancer, and many helping hands with cameras and lighting including silas, san, chango, sparky, matt, trey, and of course garrett. but upon receiving the cut, i felt like something was missing, something was lacking, the visuals being only two scenes, plus they were so closely related, made the song feel longer than it was. the back and forth with layered silas edits fell short of showcasing the world i’ve worked so hard to build. while i struggled to communicate that with garrett, ultimately it had to be done.
looking back with fresh eyes, i think the missing piece was the wavy touch. we met at my studio to talk ideas and both agreed we should shoot another scene. i brought one of my crazy wavy world ideas and we worked together to figure out how to make it happen on our short and busy schedules. the big notes from the meeting were, water… air mattress…. wings…. down to the wire, we planned for the sunday before release, and ended up rescheduling for the next day due to conflicting projects. it worked out well, i finished the wings on sunday night, made from armature wire, upcycled fabric, stuffing, thread, and pearls. inspired by an artist i’ve admired for a long time, tegdrib.
stacy got the very first license shirt, in exhange for all her hard work for this video!
(soon available to you if u want one)
so, scene three was shot on monday, 2 days prior to the release. which is an insane turnaround for ANY kind of project. by implementing scene three, it pulled the previous scenes we had shot into my world. shooting this came with more lessons to learn and more chances to pivot. first issue, it was raining. normally not a big dilemma, except for the fact that it was supposed to be shot on a drone. garrett was thinking logically and thought to move to the underpass in attempts to dodge the rain. we thought the crisis had been adverted but the drone didn’t agree with us. it freaked out, flew into multiple posts, then promptly crashed out. (hmmmm kinda sounds familar…) the wind was blowing me in the wrong direction, it was freezing, nothing was working how i thought it should, and i was getting overstimulated. on the verge of tears, i decided it was time to pivot. we packed up and headed away from the underpass and closer to the japanese gardens. if there’s one thing i know how to do, it’s adapt when my original plans start to fall through. i take a second to let the emotions pass, then the gears start turning.
it was less windy, and nick was able to kick out the air mattress more into the water without me floating back to shore so quickly. we got situated in the new spot, and things seemed to flow easier. garrett had brought his other camera, nick and chango were making sure i didn’t float away into the void, silas was shooting circuit bent pics, san on polaroids, nick christakis was helping out with lighting, and i think everyone took a turn with the vhs camera lol. once i felt a bit more comfortable in the environment, i was able to settle into giving a worthy performance.
the heartache wound i spoke of previously was fresh on that monday evening. i really felt like i learned something during those takes about sharing my vulnerability for my art. the whole shoot was emotionally charged, specifically in the one take towards the end where my eyes welled up with tears. after that take where i quite literally embodied those “female rage compilations” on tiktok, i audibly heard someone on set go “phewww”. i realized that through creating visuals for my songs, i’m giving them additional meaning and context. the song takes on a new form of relatability based on what i’m going through at the time of creation or what the intention is behind the visual.
sad and cold wavy lol
as you might know, the video dropped one minute before wavy wednesday was over. it was my final cut of the footage and garrett didn’t like my version as much as he liked his. to each their own. I felt terrible for not ending on the same page. when i had received the final cut from garrett the night before, i watched with some friends and had a bunch of critiques. garrett had already put so much time and effort into this shoot that i felt bad asking for more of his time and energy to change the cut.
we talked about postponing, i thought i might do a release of the vinyls instead… but upon making the limited edition covers the evening of wavy wednesday, i ran into some issues. i decided to take the current cut, and the previous ones, and make a new version, a wavy cut. so there i was, at the studio hours before the drop, cutting together old takes and the current one to make a visual that conveyed the message i wanted to get across. i’m happy with the way things fell into place right before the finish line. i’ve been known to pull it out of my ass at the last second, to thrive in chaos.
without my friends by my side, i wouldn’t get nearly as far as i do.
it has just now come to my realization, if you haven’t been a passenger princess in my car, you probably don’t know what radar i’m referring to… you can hear samples of my radar detector in the song… specifically the beeps into “k band” and at the very end, “overspeed”. and on the off chance you have been in my passenger seat, then you’ve probably been startled by the obnoxious beeps alerting me of oncoming radar or laser.
the lyrics, what this song is about, is more than the radar detector that prevents me (most of the time) from getting pulled over. it’s talking about the people who don’t say what they mean with their whole chest. whether it’s the people who love you and won’t confess it or the ones that hate you and won’t say it.
the intro tells them to turn it up, make some more noise, let it be known how it is they feel. but they don’t, and they won’t. into the chorus, they keep playing it cool, so imma play my part. no need for me to bait it out of them, especially when i can just dip, 60 in 6 right? the verse goes into these games that these individuals play and how they’ll manipulate, all because they can’t express how they feel directly. they will get angry when you stop choosing to play along. when you take your power back and remove it from the situation, just make sure that you watch your back.
