Saint Pepsi’s B-Side “Fall Harder” Spotlighted

SAINT PEPSI SHARES NEW TRACK “FALL HARDER”

“FIONA COYNE” B/W “FALL HARDER” OUT TODAY

To celebrate the release of his debut 7″ with new label Carpark, Saint Pepsi is back to share its b-side “Fall Harder.” Like the previously released a-side “Fiona Coyne,” this new one also features Saint Pepsi’s own vocals over lovelorn, daytime disco. “Fall Harder” is another firm step in the direction of timeless pop music, which makes sense considering Saint Pepsi recently pegged Michael Jackson & Justin Timberlake’s “Love Never Felt So Good” as his song of the summer for Vogue.

For his Carpark debut, Saint Pepsi takes a step away from the more genre-shuffling styles of his Internet releases to focus his skills on high-power pop. The title track of the “Fiona Coyne” 7-inch is an uplifting tribute to fantastical romance and the joyous dreams pop culture can provide. Mastermind Ryan DeRobertis lays down a funky guitar riff and bass line of Chic-quality to tease our senses before tickling us silly with the chorus’ ecstatic horns. “My love’s on the silver screen/ she’s always playing make believe,” sings the 21-year-old songwriter, playing a bit of make-believe himself. The song, named after a certain graduate of Degrassi Community School, acts out the fantasy of dating a TV star and plays with the idea that music can be something of a catalyst for romance.

The b-side, “Fall Harder,” is a lovelorn hit about a somewhat unattainable beauty. “You’ve got me under your spell/ and baby, I couldn’t fall harder,” DeRobertis sings over an Orange Juice-worthy riff and electronic subtleties like the sound of a Galaga battle. For this 7-inch, DeRobertis wrote danceable love songs with a nostalgic aesthetic to the production “because I think nostalgia is inherently narcissistic and I’m currently very into the idea of exploring the connection between nostalgia and narcissism,” he says.

About Saint Pepsi:

Saint Pepsi started in December 2012 as an Ableton exercise, but is now 21-year-old Ryan DeRobertis’ main outlet for songwriting and production. The Long Island-based musician’s first release with Carpark is the “Fiona Coyne” 7-inch, to be released in August, which will be followed by a full-length album in the fall. Saint Pepsi got its start with four mixtapes of new wave and synth-pop samples. As DeRobertis developed his sampling technique, he branched out into disco and funk music. The netlabel Keats Collective released the Hit Vibes album in May 2013. Around the same time, Saint Pepsi received even more attention for his “Call Me Maybe” remix, a captivating re-working of the Carly Rae Jepsen hit.

Since then, DeRobertis has been focusing on exploring the weird side of pop music. “I’m drawn to tuneful melodies; complex chord structures; outlandish synths and drums; and I like to take pop a capellas and see how I can warp the songs while keeping the melodies almost entirely intact,” he says. The “Fiona Coyne” 7-inch showcases DeRobertis’ talent for crafting his own melodies. DeRobertis sums up his ambitions simply: “I want to make pop music for freaks, basically.”