Vocalist cehryl enters 2021 announcing her new EP, time machine, out April 9th, 2021 via Nettwerk. To celebrate the announcement, she also shares her new single ‘philadelphia’.
A nostalgic piano-driven number, “philadelphia” looks back on relationships cehryl considered herself lucky to “keep in my pocket”. She relives these connections by looking back at her time spent in Philadelphia – a metaphor for all her experiences in that period, immortalised into song. Though such memories only exist in her mind, she finds a quiet acceptance that comes with knowing they are hers to cherish.
The music video finds itself in the overlap between memory and the present. DIY, iPhone-style footage is spliced with smooth, hi-res camerawork, capturing the inexplicable ways in which our past nestles itself within our daily lives.
The singer-songwriter and producer spent 2020 working on ‘time machine’, following her debut album ‘Slow Motion’. In August, she shared the first taste of new music with the track and video for “Moon Eyes” which The Wild Honey Pie said channelled “the effortless sincerity of jazz standards of yore.” In October, she also shared the music video for new song “Superbloom”, eventually closing out the year with “angels (emily)”.
The Hong Kong-based multi-hyphenate creative cehryl has a voice as dulce and mellifluous as the songs she produces and writes to. Stories that explore the complexity of human emotion fill her dreamy, genre-fusing tracks, where her lyrical flair and classical training are on full display. From the strings she rips to the production, recording, and mixing, cehryl orchestrates every part of her songs. Her painfully relatable sonic gifts have gained her an international community of fans across the globe, and find her constantly revising and refining her sound. Her music videos for “Satellite” and “Moon Eyes” are heavily inspired by celebrated Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar-Wai, and mirror his films with cehryl’s own nuanced phantasmagoria—a fitting reflection of her expansive sound.
Following high school in the UK, cehryl moved to the United States to attend Berklee College of Music in Boston and, post-college, found herself in Los Angeles forming a tight-knit scene with friends Zack Villere, Mulherin, Dijon, Alex Szotak, and Soft Glas. “Moon Eyes” and single “Hide n Seek” follow her buzzy 2019 debut album ‘Slow Motion’, which garnered her praise from Paper, Earmilk, i-D, Complex, and more. After touring with Still Woozy and Ravyn Lenae, she was slated to be on the road this summer opening for Jeremy Zucker in the U.S. and for Cavetown this fall. Both tours are on hold due to COVID-19 precautions for now, but cehryl still has plans in store for 2021.
Cover photo: Jonny Ho
