Premiere: Kellen of Troy readies new album with ‘Some Tune We All Already Know’

Originality is recycled. It’s all a delusion, and a stroke of genius is a melody, chord progression, and guitar riff reworked, reapplied, and repackaged in new shiny wrapping paper. Everything from a song to a TV show to a high-scale marketing campaign – it’s all been done before. Nashville multi-instrumentalist Kellen Wenrich, known professionally as Kellen of Troy, trims his disappointment with and acceptance of reality and pins the emotional strands to a cork board of ’70s classic pop, strings working overtime to evoke timeless rapture. He’s firmly planted then and now, allowing his voice to twist and shout between stylistic lines.

“Some Tune We All Already Know,” premiering today, anchors Wenrich’s forthcoming album called Vanity Project, expected everywhere March 13. “Please don’t listen too closely / And don’t try to discern / Any original meaning from these recycled words / I’m going to pull on your heartstrings / And make you think about home,” he pokes at classic songwriting themes. He intentionally buries broad-brushed lyrics inside a hazy vortex of guitars, drums, strings, and even a glockenspiel. Each puzzle piece is meant as a distraction, and that’s exactly the point: commercializing of art is grinding meat for mass consumption.

“Sing along, we all know how it goes,” he even offers a chorus that swings big but totally depleted of meaning.

Of the song, he writes to B-Sides & Badlands over email, calling to larger cultural trends: “It’s in theaters every summer; some big CGI blockbuster action hero spinoff sequel-to-the-prequel that worked last year so it’ll work again this year. It’s hanging on the shelves of our hippest stores, homogenized individuality priced affordably thanks to the wonders of modern mass production,” he says. “And it’s blowing up our playlists and airwaves; maybe some two chord sub-dominant to dominant late 70s LA inspired thing, or some four-on-the-floor British folk inspired thing. It’s throwback outlaw country music like it’s never been done before (that’s also authentic as hell). You don’t know the title but you can guess the lyrics. Fan fiction is no longer niche; it’s mainstream. It’s some tune we all already know.”

He adds, “It’s music we shop to.”

“Some Tune We All Already Know” is a delightful satirical centerpiece, ironically engaging the listener’s perceptions, and Wenrich cranks the musical cogs to worm right into the eardrums. “I broke a long standing cardinal rule of mine tracking this one, which is that you never put a glockenspiel on anything,” he says. “But as we were working on it, I kept wanting a high chime-y thing in the mix, and when you can’t afford a celeste you make do with what you have. Side note: this opened the flood gates, and I put that glockenspiel all over [the album].”

Vanity Project – produced by Wenrich, Ryan McFadden, and Adam Taylor (Mick Ronson) – was recorded at Nashville’s Wavy Cat Studios, The Nest, and The Bomb Shelter.

Listen below:

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