True Colors (Zedd album)

True Colors
Studio album by Zedd
Released	19 May 2015 (2015-05-19)
Recorded	2014
Genre	Progressive house, dance-pop, complextro, electro house
Length	48:01
Label	Interscope
Producer	Zedd
Zedd chronology
Clarity (2012) True Colors (2015)
Singles from True Colors
"I Want You to Know" Released: 23 February 2015 "Addicted to a Memory" Released: 14 April 2015

True Colors is the second studio album by Russian-German Grammy-winning electronic dance musician Zedd, scheduled to be released on 19 May 2015 by Interscope Records.^[1] The first single from the album, "I Want You to Know" featuring Selena Gomez was released on 23 February 2015. On 14 April 2015, Zedd released another track, "Addicted to a Memory" that features the group Bahari, that the users can download from iTunes with when they pre-order the album.^[2][3]

Background

In late February during an interview with a radio station, when answering a question on his album-making processes, Zedd stated that "I'm really far advanced in my album right now. It’s probably still going to take me a good month, month-and-a-half to finish it, you know, the last touches. And then depending on if I can keep that promise of one-and-a-half months, it’s going to come out sooner or later!"^[4] In the middle of March, Zedd took on his Twitter and uploaded a series of short videos that teased True Colors. The videos uploaded unveiled a website that was mostly empty except for Zedd's logo and a timer counting down to the March 19, at 5 p.m.^[5][6]

On 7 April 2015, Zedd finally released the name, artwork, and release date of the album via Instagram.^[7] The artwork features a tree with an array of bright colours as the leaves.^[8] He also announced that T-Mobile, through a promotional partnership, offered 250,000 free downloads of the remix of "I Want You to Know" to the fans who followed T-Mobile’s Facebook and Twitter on the morning of 8 April.^[9][10]

The website was revealed the start of a creatively-themed promotional campaign for the album that covers 10 secret locations near 10 different cities, with a new song to be premiered in each location.^[11] In each place the campaign visit, fans of Zedd need to through a specially dedicated Twitter for the tour and follow the clues provided to find the stylized Z stickers (Zedd's insignia), take a photo with any one of the stickers, and be the first 50 people to arrive to a checkpoint to enable them to be transported to a secret location for preview party of a new song. The first location was Longhorn Cavern State Park near Austin, Texas where Zedd was one of the artist for South by Southwest held there.^[12][13] The second event was organised in a desert near Joshua Tree, California, with the starting place being Los Angeles.^[14][15] The third city visited for the campaign was Phoenix, Arizona^[16] while the fourth is revealed San Francisco.^[17] Each stop has similar color-themed decorations and food, and holds different surprises for the fans. All fans are also given free Beats headphones by Dr. Dre.

The list of places visited by the tour are (as of 27 April 2015):

When talking about his album, Zedd remarked that he "...wanted fans to experience the album in a whole new way". He further said that each song is associated with a color, and this is evident through his promotional tour, in which each location has different color scheme to match with the vibe of the song previewed in the location.^[20] Zedd commented during the promotional campaign in Los Angeles that, "To me, certain things sound a certain color. A lot of reverb will always sound cold, which will always make me think blue. On this song ("Straight Into the Fire"), the drop is very energetic and very aggressive, kind of like fire, too, so this one was super easy to pick orange."^[21] In Austin, the theme colour was purple, while yellow was used in Phoenix, and blue was used in Denver.^[14][19]

Songs

Singles

"I Want You to Know" was released as the first single from the album on 23 February 2015. It features vocals by Selena Gomez and received generally positive reviews from critics.^[22] The music video was released on March 10, 2015, directed by Brent Bonacorso and edited by Anthony Chirco.^[23] In a promotion with T-Mobile, a remix version of the song by Milo & Otis were given to fans who followed the instructions given.

Other songs

"Addicted to a Memory" was released as a promotional track to be downloaded when pre-ordered on iTunes beginning 14 April 2015 and was subsequently released to streaming sites such as Spotify and Beats Music later that day. This five-minute track features the American girl group Bahari.^[24][2] The song begins in a pop style before it drops to a smattering of thumping bass and heavy, gritty synthesizers.

Track listing

References

External links

• The official website for True Colors
• The official Twitter for True Colors promotional campaign