SadInSF members channel emotion, friendship through music; Collaboration of Carlmont High grads recently played Palo Alto festival
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Scattered LEGO pieces, Nerf guns and towers of cardboard boxes packed with Christmas ornaments surround a keyboard and a mic stand in a Peninsula garage. The smell of cats grows stronger by the hour, prompting allergic sneezes.
Welcome to the makeshift studio of SadInSF, a collaboration of teenage artists who produce and release their work on the music-sharing platform Soundcloud.
The name is ironic: SadInSF’s five members — all recent graduates of Carlmont High in Belmont -— live about 20 miles south of San Francisco and their sound is anything but sad.
ZJ Kuchlenz, Ziad Kedkad, Brandon Gee, Adrian Cunningham and Justin Simoneau grew up together, and their studio sessions — often in Simoneau’s garage or Kedkad’s basement —are often interrupted by laughter, Nerf gun wars and wrestling matches.
“We’re completely the opposite of sad,” said Kedkad, who goes by CXC Mel on Soundcloud. “We’re all really happy people and most of us have supportive families.”
Each member has his own style and personality, which comes through in their music, and the way they act and dress. “Dr. Escape,” one of the first songs they produced as a group, has an upbeat tone with the verses showcasing different vocalists and different styles.
Kuchlenz’s opening light vocals transition to a rap by Cunningham, in which he talks about wanting to end a relationship because he is “leaving for college, and I cannot leave you on my conscience.” And then Kuchlenz — known as ZJ del Mar — comes back with an explicit verse that contradicts the song’s previous melancholy. The song’s tempo increases, and Gee contributes a fast-paced rap and moody lyrics that stem from difficult moments in life.
“It’s not the music that’s sad, but the lyrics that are sad,” said Gee, aka Midnight. “Our lyrics talk about our struggles and our emotions, but our music is generally upbeat.”
The members of SadInSF have been collaborating for about a year, and their songs are sometimes made not long after an idea pops into someone’s head. “The whole thing was pretty chaotic,” said Cunnigham, who goes by Adrian QMC. “When I gave my beat to Ziad he immediately fell in love and wanted us to do a collab, but soon enough everyone else joined in and together we met at Ziad’s house.”
After performing mostly at Carlmont events, SadInSF played at the Buoyancy Teen Music & Art Festival in Palo Alto on June 3, one of the first times they had performed in front of a large, non-school crowd.
“The Palo Alto Buoyancy festival was definitely the best moment for us as a group,” Cunningham said. “There was a huge crowd and just seeing people dance and sing along to our songs was the best feeling ever.”
Though the group recently graduated from Carlmont High School and will soon be off to college, Kuchlenz is confident they will continue producing music — even if they can’t meet for a studio session every Friday.
“I just can’t picture a life without them,” Kuchlenz said. “I’ve known them for so long that it’s almost impossible not being able to keep in touch and talk about music and just have fun.”