Sam Backoff, Savana Santos and Sami Bearden are back. The three, known as Avenue Beat, have skewered the pandemic, social isolation, dead pets, bad romance and a failed release as they surreptitiously released “F2020” on TikTok. Seven million views 48-hours later, TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Matthew Panzarino tweeted its the “Song of the Year,” cited by Vice and Lefsetz, plus endorsed by artists like Maren Morris, Bebe Rexha, Anne Marie and Kristin Chenoweth.
Evoking Robert Palmer’s dead-panned vixens of “Addicted To Love,” Avenue Beat is nobody’s back-up prop. The trio of theater nerds from Quincy, Illinois write, program, harmonize and conceptualize everything – commando-style – with a wink and nudge to how F’d things can be.
Just as importantly as the low impact track rolls and their angelic harmonies rise, the video behind them calls out the social injustices plaguing their conscious. Images of Justice for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Elijah McClain and Tony McDade, the postponed Olympics, President Trump, killer hornets, Kobe Bryant, the Australian wildfires, hazmat suits and their extended middle finger offer a time capsule of how hard the year is sucking.
Exactly what you’d expect from underneath the baggy clothes and wicked side-eye, the three genre fluid creators distill the angst of their generation. Whether it’s the gently candid “i don’t really like your boyfriend,” to hype their friend to the passive aggressive ways of toxic masculinity or “thank you anxiety,” written shortly after moving away from home, the way social awkwardness makes life patently awful, this is the current Generation Next swims in.
Recognizing the narrowing of the portal, the increased speed of life, the impossible expectations and the shrinking realm of opportunities, Avenue Beat continues doing what they do best: laugh and tell the truth. Being honest, real and up front, they’re placing the blame squarely where it belongs: a year gone massively, horribly wrong.
They may not have any answers, but they believe in collective consciousness. Having written the song, that pretty succinctly says it all, they just want you to sing along…