Boombox Blitz: Barkley won’t pick up her phone at ‘3AM’

Welcome to Boombox Blitz, an artist spotlight series showcasing overlooked singers, songwriters and musicians who are quietly taking over the world.

In the digital age, our past is immortalized on records, social media and videotape. Barkley (real name Susie Yankou) learned the hard way when she visited her hometown of Toronto over the holidays. Upon discovering a vintage camcorder, circa mid-00s, she began piecing together a former relationship, etching and tying together grainy footage as a way to retell the story from beginning to end, opening on a hangover and working backward. “[The camera] had the most delightfully tacky look,” she says of the practically obsolete artifact, which her brother used for skateboarding videos back in the day. “I was so inspired and knew it had to be the centerpiece of the video.”

Then teaming up with her friend David Aberg, the visual’s esteemed director, who she befriend during her USC film-study days, the two masterminded a sequence that is bother beautiful and tragic. “We start by seeing my present-day self, waking up the night after a wild party, and through interspersed camcorder memories, we tell the story of the relationship, all the way up until the camcorder memories catch up to the present. We tried to make the video give you that same feeling as the song — sweet, romantic and kind of devastating,” says Yankou, whose visage onscreen is commanding and wholly endearing.

On the song itself, she describes to Atwood, “[It] is about being with someone who you know you’ll never fully have, but they give you just enough hope that you keep trying. You roll your eyes when they hit you up every Friday night, but you know you’ll probably have a fucking magical time, until it’s over and they ignore you for another 6 days.”

“3AM” glitches and lurches in true electro-pop style, feeling polished but undeniably alternative. Yankou’s voice flits and flutters across the homespun arrangement, weighty but brittle. “Why do I pick up my phone?” she mourns, just before the house-lite beat drops and swirls into oblivion.

Watch below:

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