If there is a more anticipated local record this year than Oryx & Crake’s forthcoming sophomore LP, I haven’t heard of it. The album, due out Sept. 25 via Deer Bear Wolf Records, has been four years in the making, and although the O&C line-up is a little leaner this time (down from nine members to six), the songwriting core of Ryan Peoples, Rebekah Goode-Peoples and Matt Jarrard remains. In anticipation of the upcoming release, the group recently unveiled the video for the record’s second single, “The World Will Take Care of Me.”
The video is notable for the band’s collaboration with the the Green Room and re:imagine/ATL, an Atlanta nonprofit that seeks to empower young people from all backgrounds by offering access and education in film and music production. In the video, a homeless boy wanders through the day—stealing, surviving and sharing his spoils—before returning to the cardboard box he calls home. The young protagonist is played by Sebastian Peoples, son of Ryan and Rebekah. With the exception of a whimsical interlude that features his parents and cellist Jarrard, all of Peoples’ co-stars are Green Room summer camp students. The video’s theme of isolation and struggle is not a reach for many of these kids, many of whom have been victims of abuse or neglect.
To get the kid’s take, we talked to Sebastian about what it was like to work on a project with students from backgrounds so different from his own. Sebastian told us that as they worked together “the entire Green Room became like your friends… They were just normal kids.” The young actor had some ideas about the concept, too. “The song and the video are not too far apart. It’s all about a big family, sort of like this band is part of my family.”
The kid may be on to something. If you’re familiar with Oryx & Crake—and you should be if you were here in Atlanta when they burst onto the scene in 2010—you know that they can pack a mighty punch with only a few lyrical strokes. Typical of Peoples and his muse, there is an existential edge to “The World Will Take Care of Me.” Does the title have meaning in comfort or in spite? Does “take care” mean to protect or to deliver some kind of penance? Is it all just in my mind—how I sense it and how I respond? Or is it just about family and taking care of one another?
In the video, a solitary boy finds loneliness, fear, desire, joy and satisfaction in a day’s journey. An older reflection of that child might find all the same things in his adult relationships.
Oryx & Crake’s sophomore LP, Marriage, is out Sept. 25.
Oryx & Crake will celebrate the release of Marriage on Sat., Sept. 12 at the Earl. Supporting them will be Sye Elaine Spence. Doors open at 9 p.m. Admission is $10.
More Info
Web: oryx-and-crake.com
Bandcamp: oryxandcrake.bandcamp.com
Facebook: @oryxandcrakeband
Instagram: @oryxncrake
SoundCloud: @oryxandcrake
Twitter: @oryxncrake