The Blackpool alt-rock trio Rendered has always known their way around emotional honesty. However, their brand new single, "If a Boy, Still Believe," pushes a different button that resonates long after the final chord disappears.
Recorded at Berlin Recording Studios, the song serves as both tribute and time capsule, preserving the ephemeral moments of life and love through a father's eyes and a friend's memory. It's personal. It's painful.
Frontman Chris grounds the song's heart with a dual perspective with the wonder of his newborn son Alfie and the soul-deep sorrow in the wake of his friend Danny's early-age death at just 43. That tension between beginnings and endings, belief and grief, gives the track its emotional weight.
"If a Boy, Still Believe" is a slow-burning verse that blooms like a sunrise, gentle at first, then burning in intensity. The acoustic guitars create a warm, rich foundation on which phased and chorused textures wheel-like memories are half-remembered. Dave Sadler's bass work is a standout, with lines that slice through the reverb with quiet insistence. The arrangement swells gradually, with great grandeur, and recalls Roy Orbison's sweeping sadness while keeping one foot still stuck in the soil of modern alt-rock.
"If a Boy, Still Believe" is a moment of visibility, a musical line of communication between generations, and a touching remembrance of what it means to feel deeply and love with abandon. Rendered has crafted a song about fatherhood and the delicate beauty of belief.