Michael Clifford debuts electrifying pop solo album “SIDEQUEST”
Michael Clifford takes notes from bandmates and releases his first solo album. The guitarist of pop rock band 5 Seconds of Summer has debuted his first solo album. All the members have now released their own side projects all while still working on music for the band. Not every band is capable of doing that.
SIDEQUEST clocks in at 27 minutes with a total of ten tracks and is packed with punchy pop anthems, three of which have features from Porter Robinson, Waterparks, and Ryan Hall.
Opening the album, Clifford is joined with producer Porter Robinson. “kill me for always” is a toss up of acoustic guitar and intense electronic swells to the chorus, almost creating a battle with the instrumental, which stays true to Porter’s style of music. Clifford has mentioned previously that Robinson was one of his favorite artists and it was a dream to be able to work with him.
Teamed up with fellow bandmate Calum Hood for the first single titled “cool”, the song dives into self identity anxiety and quirky niche lyrics of jokes only 5sos fans would understand. “I guess I don’t see what she sees in me / Confidence doesn’t come so easily / When you’re the guy who caught fire with the colored hair / From the band with the song about underwear / Nobody cares, they’re unaware / I’m fine, I swear / Am I cool enough?” Clifford references a performance his band did in 2015 where he walked into a pyro machine and caught his hair on fire.
“give me a break!” is essentially a rant in song form made by Clifford and Awsten Knight from the pop band Waterparks. Clifford told Kerrang! “I’d been really wanting to create something unique with Awsten and Waterparks. Awsten became my person that I would vent to about different things in life and I think that that’s the kind of the energy that this song has. It’s very authentic to us.” To add to the silliness of the album, the music video for the single is inspired by the farfetchness of fanfiction.
“eclipse” is the track that closes the album, however it’s very unique and vastly different from the other songs. Clifford became a dad two years ago and the track appears to be a nod to his child and the new baby on the way. He took to Instagram on album release day with a baby announcement captioned “table for 4 please”. The joys of becoming a parent is something Clifford talks about frequently so it was only right for him to include something in the album for his daughters. John Feldmann (who 5sos has previously worked with) helped make Eclipse as well as Clifford’s bandmates wife Sierra Hemmings.
To promote the album, Complex hosted a pop-up shop in LA where fans could purchase merchandise, the new album, and even meet Michael Clifford and buy some clothing from his personal collection. . You can also catch Clifford at the Fonda in LA for a ONO performance on the 31th. SIDEQUEST is now available on all streaming platforms.
