Chromatics’ new album “Dear Tommy” is of the bands’ creation by Chromatics Ruth Radelet, Johnny Jewel, Adam Miller and Nat Walker. In Feb, Chromatics release “Time Rider” and announce their first tour in five years, one that will feature audiovisual “experiences,” including short films directed by Jewel and mixed live by video artist Danny Perez.
On Christmas Day 2015, Chromatics producer and lead songwriter, Johnny Jewel, nearly drowned in Hawaii, causing him to so intensely re-evaluate his life that he eventually destroyed tens of thousands of copies of the album that had already been made. (Jewel also destroyed the first version of Chromatics’ 2012 classic, Kill for Love.) The intervening years have seen a maddening number of false starts and missed release dates.
But they’ve also found the former Portlander helming more than 20 other projects, including performing on Twin Peaks: The Return, becoming a David Lynch confidant, releasing his first solo albums and becoming a sought-after film score composer in Hollywood. On top of all that, Chromatics have put out well over an album’s worth of material, most of which is extremely promising.
Jewel released Digital Rain, a record inspired by his nostalgic yearning for the rainier climate of his past while living in L.A. The album features “City of Roses,” an ode to Portland inspired by the “constant kiss of drizzle on the streets of Portland, and the morning rain against the windshield of TriMet city bus No. 15 that I would ride home after recording all night.”
Jewel releases Themes for Television, an album consisting of unused music recorded for Twin Peaks. Jewel says the ominous record of instrumentals is “a sonic exploration of the sounds I was hearing in my nightmares,” making it abundantly clear why he and Lynch became such fast friends.
Last year the group released ‘Black Walls’, a track taken from the forthcoming LP. In the video, Ruth Radelet can be seen holding one of the copies of Dear Tommy that Johnny Jewel destroyed after a near-death experience.