Color Collage have released their new single ‘What A Time To Be Alive’.
Poking fun at the 21st-century focus on social media, personal relationships, and how these two intertwine to either build-up or destroy a person, the new indie infused track follows 2019’s popular release ‘Eye On You’.
Speaking of the single, Color frontman Shane Conerty said: “‘What a Time to Be Alive’ is all about death, technology, and love. Now that I think about it, a lot of my songs are about at least one of those things. It’s often all three! Anyways, I always wanted to write a song that could be played at my own funeral. Maybe it’s this one, or maybe I’ll write a better one to replace it someday. But for now, if I don’t make it, play this song when I go.”
To celebrate their new single release, Color Collage shared with us 5 tracks that influenced ‘What A Time To Be Alive’.
Purple Mountains – Storyline Fever | Listen via Spotify
This entire album had and will forever have a huge impact on me. The level of honesty is truly inspiring. It’s almost rapping and it all fits into the same rhyme scheme. Brilliant stuff. Songwriters like David Berman have pushed me to write like no one’s listening, and that’s liberating. He’ll be missed.
Michael Nau – Love Survive | Listen via Spotify
I’ve been a fan of Michael Nau for a really long time. From his former band Page France to the next iteration Cotton Jones, his voice and subject matter changed enough that you sometimes couldn’t recognize it being the same guy singing. I admire that evolution, that growth. Color Collage has done a fair amount of growing as well. The first album was produced and performed solely by me and it was electronic pop. These days, there’s 6 of us and the band has evolved into this amalgamation of style and genre that makes me really excited about the road we’re on.
Conor Oberst – A Little Uncanny | Listen via Spotify
Conor Oberst is my favorite songwriter of all time. In my opinion, he doesn’t write bad songs. His evolution from all the early Bright Eyes stuff has also been really inspiring to witness. I love all the name dropping in this song. It’s also just a simple three-chord song, but as usual the lyrics are just so smart and good and personal yet universal. That’s an aspiration of mine, too. To write personal stuff that’s still relatable. That’s the goal at least.
Matt Maltese – Nightclub Love | Listen via Spotify
Matt Maltese is one of my favorite young songwriters. That makes me sound old. Anyways, he’s got really clever and witty songs. They’ve also got this realism that even if the thing he’s singing about didn’t happen, they’re so real and relatable that you just assume they did. “I pass you a drink while the creeps circle around you. Trying to figure out if I’m just one of them too.” Slow clap. So good.
Kid Charlemagne – Steely Dan | Listen via Spotify
It’s hard to pick just one of their songs! I got into Steely Dan pretty late. When I was younger I just dismissed them as showoffs. As I got older and lived more, I started to understand and appreciate Donald Fagen’s lyrics so much more. A good example is the first line of Dirty Work. He’s singing about a guy that’s lonely but scared and too broke to get a prostitute, so he’s looking for a hookup somewhere else. “Times are hard, and you’re afraid to pay the fee, so you find yourself somebody that can do the job for free.” Mind blown emoji. Ok, back to the song on the list. Is this too long? Anyways Kid Charlemagne is the story of a drug dealer that gets a little too popular and has to skip town. Another song that I just didn’t “get” when I was younger. “Is there gas in the car? Yes there’s gas in the car. I think the people down the hall know who are. Careful what you carry, cuz The Man is wise. You are still an outlaw in their eyes.” I mean, come on. I could go on and and on and on and on about Steely Dan and music in general, but I’ll spare you any more ramblings.
You can listen to Color ‘What A Time To Be Alive’ below: