Through a forest of dense textures that pull from a multitude of corners in rock music emerges Tetsu the Phoenix’s “Mr. Sunshine.” This single will leave you in a state of hypnosis. Warping melodies coil around fuzzy guitars for a shoegaze-inspired record. Hazy vocals deliver a potent and complex concept executed to the highest order. The heavy drum patterns add a gut-punch effect to the otherwise lush tune. Although, “lush” doesn’t begin to cover the work. Tetsu’s fearless creativity creates expansive landscapes that hold the complexity of the human experience. “Mr. Sunshine” is an all-encompassing listening experience by an artist whose lofty ideas and experimental tendencies sound warm and familiar.
“The second verse in this song is a powerfully honest moment for me as an artist and as a person. For a long time, in no small part due to how I was raised and the value systems I grew up within, I tried to project strength, confidence, and a sort of cold hardness that seemed like the right thing for ‘a man’ in America,’” explains the band on their new single. “An outward sign was a propensity for denim all over, dressing like a tough guy out of Easy Rider, that began to shift as I began to understand my relationship with my identity within the queer spectrum. The verse ends ‘your denim daddy played it hard / always a softy, always,’ a gift of a moment for me to myself, allowing me to take ownership of what is actually true for me and to find strength in softness after years of trying to be strong by cosplaying a caricature of a thing that I am not. ‘Mr. Sunshine’ contains infinitely many angles from which light can reflect. How we turn ourselves in that light matters a lot, and what we see in ourselves and what the world sees in us has to do with our ability to turn ourselves toward the honest and true.”
