The Chester French Blog

Check out Hip Hop DX’s 4 Star Review of our debut album, “Love the Future”:

For an artist, the key to maintaining one’s own identity is to steer clear of drawing inspiration from like-sounding artists. Years back, Method Man [click to read] would listen to Miles Davis when he recorded, and ironically Fiona Apple would listen to Method Man (the whole Wu-Tang Clan in fact). As Hip Hop artists broaden their horizons in sound and style, the music they draw inspiration from starts to veer further and further from Rap. Years from now, DXnext artists Chester French [click to read] will be the group they still play in the studio.

When Harvard grads D.A. Wallach and Max Drummey formed Chester French, the heavy Pharrell [click to read] cosign would suggest that their music would hold some degree of an “urban” tinge. Thankfully their debut album Love the Future includes none of that, besides a Star Trak label. Here is a group adored by Hip Hop heads, simply by being themselves – messy haired white boys in khakis and oxford shirts crafting Rock reminiscent of the ‘60s and ‘70s.

Love the Future is an amalgam of sounds that closely resemble that era of Rock that we only heard about but never fully experienced live. It’s that Almost Famous Rock when Rolling Stone was on its A-game mixed with the British invasion. It’s the Beach Boys back when they were at war with The Beatles, plus a touch of the 1910 Fruitgum Company It’s drenched in Rock, yet there’s an underlying Soul to it.

The first singles heard from Chester French, “She Loves Everybody” and “The Jimmy Choos” were decent indicators that this group loved by Rap was not comprised of rappers. “She Loves Everybody” takes haunting strings and vocals that later emerge into a synthy Rock party, while “The Jimmy Choos” bring the guitars and drums into unified basslines, enough for any Hip-Hop fan to nod his head like he’s jocking Jay-Z.

Lyrically, Chester French insert straight-laced humor into songs about love and not getting enough of it, but still romancing with lines like “this ain’t groupie love ‘cause you mean so much to me/You’re my Bebe Ruell, you’re my Puerto Rican Pamela Lee” on the snappy “Bebe Ruell” or the dark Johnny Cash-ish “Beneath the Veil”. There are no real low points on Love the Future, with even the interludes sounding like viable album cuts.

Chester French isn’t the first group to sample days past. We hear it everyday in Hip Hop, and in Indie Rock groups like Vampire Weekend, the Kooks, and the Klaxons. The difference is in CF’s approach, and while anyone’s Rock-loving parents might mistakenly call Chester French biters, we can call them the reason why a Soulja Boy fan might pick up a Beatles CD someday.

-DA & Max