“I will never be perfect, but I’ll always be real”
Singer, songwriter, and producer Clark Rainbow recently released her newest track, “BSOD”, this October.
Clark Rainbow is an artist from the UK, whose first track on streaming platforms was released in 2019, yet after a 5-year hiatus ending in May, she has returned to the scene and dropped numerous singles that have been streamed by millions. She creates sounds that are reminiscent of Y2K, hyperpop, and other various sounds that would fit in an early 2000s AMV (Anime Music Video). “I just make fun little beepy songs in my room” says Rainbow.
This November, I had the opportunity to speak with Clark and gain some insight into her journey as an artist and her sources of inspiration.
“Has music been a thing you’ve been doing for a large part of your life? Is it kind of a newer, later discovery that you’ve been really into?”
Clark Rainbow: “It’s been just my whole life. I started doing music stuff when my mum made me and my sister play an instrument, and I started playing the harp. I like to sing as well, but I think I was a bit shy of singing. I don’t know why. I was just like, this is pushy and…I was a bit afraid. I started doing more singing stuff because, I don’t know, I just decided to be good at it, I don’t know. It took time, but I just really wanted to be good at it.”
Rainbow delves into her time at university, saying how during the time frame of getting her degree in music, the period also became a roadblock in being able to create and release music. However, after finishing her program, she decided:
Clark Rainbow: “Let’s not mess around anymore. I had undiagnosed ADHD, so I couldn’t take it seriously, but now I’m medicated. So, I went to YouTube University and just sat and learned.”
“I wanted to talk about your newest track, Blue Screen of Death. That is what the acronym is for, right?”
Clark Rainbow: “Some people have thought it stands for… Bullshit Overdose”
Rainbow states how the song carries themes relating to an old experience with her computer crashing, downloading mods for The Sims 4, as well as her relationship with the internet.
Clark Rainbow: “It’s just like what I’m making money off all my art, all my friends, playing games with people, and work is all in my PC. If I go for a walk in the woods, I’m completely detached from my life. Like everything is, it’s in this little box”
Simultaneously, Rainbow says she wanted the song to be able to be interpreted as a person as well, if that’s what the listener so desires.
Clark Rainbow: “I like it with my songs when it’s a little vague, so people can take what they want from it.”
“When I first found you online, you were, I think, a little less than 10,000 monthly listeners on Spotify, and just the other week, you hit 100,000. How does that feel?”
Clark Rainbow: “It’s a bit strange. But I hope that I can keep it up and get out of a mindset of ‘oh it’s only because I made one or two good songs.’ I hopefully want to keep it consistent, so I keep making people happy.”
When asking what she believed attributed to this growth, Clark makes a point of most of
the luck and the algorithmic jackpot.
Clark Rainbow: “People keep asking me this, like I’ve got like a secret formula and I’m not sure because I think I’m just I think I’m just quite lucky. I’ve seen very, very talented people that are buried by algorithms and stuff. In August, BeReal like randomly popped off…like it predictably did well because of like some social media posts that I did about it. But it randomly did well one day when I hadn’t posted for like three days. I suppose this is why people tell people to post every day…Your base luck gets increased. I think that’s my theory on it”
Fast-forward to the beginning of December, and Clark has released her newest single, “Harajuku Girl”, on all major streaming platforms. Clark Rainbow is on the rise and here to stay, and keep your eyes peeled for a potential EP/album in the upcoming year.
Why should people stream your music?
Clark Rainbow: Because it’s fun and you can just like, you can have fun and it’s like… All made by a human. It’s all just made by one guy in the room. No corpos, just little old me.