Recommended If You Like: Biscuits & Gravy, Stevie Wonder, Justin Timberlake
Love doesn’t happen overnight: It starts as an innocent, back-of-mind idea; a twinkle in one’s eye, or a curve in one’s smile. From there it grows, developing as experiences become memories that foster increasingly intense emotions. Life happens, and slowly two lives become intertwined. It all seems to go so fast when one looks back, but the truth is that feelings develop over time…
… Yet then again, there are some moments that push you all in. You see a world that could be, you fall head over heels for somebody, and that’s the end of that. Why wait, when your heart feels so sure of itself? Newcomers Charge the Atlantic capture love’s unknowable pace on their soulful, heart-on-sleeve new single “Something You Feel.”
‘Cause you think you’re sly
But the way I make you smile
I’m not feeling the game, no reason why
It’s not so much out of the woodwork, you see
But that we’re cutting a new piece
And I knew it should be you and me…
But is it something you feel?
Listen: “Something You Feel” – Charge the Atlantic
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/295156654″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=true&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]
Atwood Magazine is proud to be premiering “Something You Feel,” the latest offering from soul/R&B band Charge the Atlantic. The jazz-trained, Nashville-by-way-of-Rhode Island four-piece consists of vocalist/bassist Kyle Barboza, vocalist/keyboardist/guitarist Patrick Krystman, guitarist Alexander Curnow, and drummer Peter Racine Jr., all young twenty-somethings who studied music in the Northeast before truckin’ south. According to the band’s website, Charge the Atlantic “was founded on the idea of creating music that is not only catchy and memorable, but also musically and lyrically profound. We miss the substance and sense of adventure that used to exist in popular music. We cherish instrumental command where it can be found. We want to give you songs to which you can sing and move as well as enjoy for their musical richness.”
Need they say more? Charge the Atlantic are committed to their passions above all else. That dedication echoes in their energy-filled name – to charge is to truly drive headfirst into something, and the Atlantic, for those who know it well, is the most formidable opponent and landlubber might face, full of unknown depths and equally strong potential.
But Charge the Atlantic aren’t singing of wayward journeys into the blue abyss – not, at least, on this track. “Something You Feel” is about the loving feeling that hits you in the face, telling you to run with it as fast as you can. Sung from lover to loved one, the chorus-derived title is something of a question: “Is it something you feel?” sings a swooning Barboza amidst a vibing cloud of horns, keys, etc. “Girl, you should let me know if this is real.”
It’s a climax filled with the type of uncertainty that males so often try to mask with confidence, but here we see it as it usually plays out behind closed doors: The pinnacle of truth and hope for this relationship is a plea.
Charge the Atlantic perfectly build to this musico-emotional collision. “Something You Feel” starts off with a series of nonchalant snaps, building a laid-back vibe with a gorgeously emotive 1960s Rhodes keyboard. Barboza mentions he’s “not feeling the game” – he doesn’t want to play the typical rose petal drop, that passive keep it alive ’til it dies, date/wait/date/wait suitor scenario that so often leaves us with more questions about ourselves than answers about another.
The music maintains its relaxed tone while building a full and vibrant aura around the bouncing vocal line. The drums roll and the bass anchors each chord up until the chorus, where brass barges in and takes over handily. Such inclusion is so fitting and appropriate for the band’s jazz-influenced brand of fresh, warm and full sounds. It’s a nod to that fully-immersive music that Stevie Wonder unleashed upon the whole world, a fusion of colors and sounds that go together like peanut butter and jelly.
“Like you and me,” Charge the Atlantic might say. “You want to know if in my heart, there’s room for two… My butterfly, don’t think I don’t have love for you.” The mid-section build impressively increases the song’s octane, while also rounding out the story. There’s more to this one-sided request; the girl want to trust in the narrator’s proclaimed love, and she doesn’t yet fully believe it. She might have good reason to feel this way, especially if it came so totally out of the blue. This kind of songwriting paints a full picture for us listeners: We see the conversation unfold before our eyes, feel the sparks flying as the band’s energy increases, increases, and increases – hitting its peak, and then fading…
Charge the Atlantic end “Something You Feel” on a muted trumpet solo, as if to show that the answer – whether she reciprocates that love or not – has nothing to do with the question that’s been posed. Indeed, the answer is itself another entity. To feel love for another is totally different than feeling loved; “Something You Feel” is all about the placement of those ecstatic feelings. I love you; is this love real (is it mutual?) In their perfect execution, Charge the Atlantic are able to animate that heart-on-one’s-sleeve sincerity in all of us. “Something You Feel” is more than a question; it’s also an answer – the answer to what each of us should do with our own strong, undeniable feelings. Let them out – share your love; who knows what you might find in return?
Recorded at Nashville’s Bulleagle Studios with Jonathann Jrade-Rice at the production helm, “Something You Feel” is fresh and satisfying. “We’ve heard a lot of bands nowadays playing on people’s nostalgia by recycling sounds from the 70s and 80s,” says Charge the Atlantic’s Patrick Krystman, “but most of them aren’t doing anything creative to further the legacies of these bands that crafted these sounds we’re now so familiar with. What we tried to accomplish in this song is to fuse that Stevie Wonder 70s sounds with contemporary artists like Justin Timberlake and then throwing something fresh over that foundation that you may not recognize, but hopefully enjoy.” Authenticity flows through Charge the Atlantic’s musical, lyrical and explanatory voice. Don’t miss this head-turning single, and stay tuned for more heart from these guys in the coming months.
— — — —
Connect with Charge the Atlantic on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram
Discover more new music on Atwood’s Picks
cover photo: Charge the Atlantic © 2016
