Finding the ‘real’ Chris Farren underneath his outward persona is quite a task. With 2016’s Can’t Die and now with his most recent release, Born Hot, Farren has cultivated an identity that bristles with manic energy and weird art – but underneath that upbeat exterior lies a vulnerable inner world that’s much more stark and honest than his self-cultivated mythos would initially suggest.
One-half of the pop-punk duo Antarctigo Vespucci, in a broad sense Farren can be seen as the pop yin to collaborator Jeff Rosenstock’s punk yang. It’s not an absolute dichotomy, but Farren’s ability to write catchy pop hooks should not be understated, and it anchors the success of his solo work. And in typical Farren fashion, the announcement and release of Born Hot was accompanied by an over-the-top display of merch, including matchstick-shaped pins, oven mitts, and even a certain hat styled in the vein of a popular adult entertainment website.
Farren ups the ante even more during live performances – the stage is so active, almost alive, that it really doesn’t feel like one is watching a solo act. His phone hooks into a monolithic stand wrapped in holiday lights, like some ancient crystalline relic, and atop that podium sits a host of small contraptions that control not only his backing tracks, but also a pair of projectors that bathe the room in whatever images Farren desires, from shifting abstract patterns to a declaration that it’s precisely 90 days until his birthday.
A red LED array attached to his pedal board sends a crimson constellation across his body and guitar. It’s a feast for the eyes as much as the ears, and Farren himself is supremely animated as he bounces up and down and struts about the stage, often as hand-drawn caricatures of himself appear on the screen behind him. The projectors are programmed to call out every single guitar solo in the set as well, just to be extra.
But beneath the bombast and spectacle he’s created, Farren exposes his tender truths on the inside of Born Hot. From the very beginning, the album is a tale of someone who’s trapped by their own circumstances: stuck at home, pursuing loose ends in lieu of a sense of meaning that has eluded him. Throughout his set, Farren plays an array of songs that simultaneously excite with their big choruses and uplifting riffs, but in the lyrics he’s illuminating a wealth of insecurities. ‘Search 4 Me’ finds him lost in his own head, weeping with regret and insecurity about his body. ‘I Was Amazing’ most blatantly turns its title and premise on its head, telling a tale of a man whose reality is anything but.
In a way Chris Farren’s most impressive work of art is the duality he keeps within himself, the line he’s endlessly walking. He draws listeners in with the panache and style of his music and promotion, and then inverts the polarity of that domain. But there’s hope in his vision, too, and always a self-effacing, amicable sense of humor: ‘Domain Lapse’ ends with a reassurance that, even after so long in a soul-crushing job, it’s never too late to start again.
Perhaps most resonant of all is ‘Human Being’, a crying-out from Can’t Die that sees him looking for a glimpse of reality in a world that seems to be focused on pretending. Before the song, Farren coyly asks the crowd if they know the price of some exorbitant number of balloons. A few guesses ring out from the crowd, but none are correct – “Seventy-six dollars!” Farren reveals, as several large black bags are hoisted onstage and Farren begins tossing them out to the crowd.
Naturally, they’re branded with his face. He emerges into the crowd, walking across the room’s dance floor and singing, surrounded by smiling faces. And just by those faces, it’s easy to see that this place, together, sharing in this moment, everyone in the room feels as human as they can be. When the show concludes with Farren – and his projectors – declaring, as ever, “another perfect set”, it’s hard not to feel that’s a little more accurate than the tongue-in-cheek nature of his humor would suggest.
Review and Photos by Collin Heroux
