The Human Condition

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## **Singles from *The Human Condition***

1. "All Time Low"
Released: May 13, 2016
2. "Overwhelming"
Released: April 25, 2017

***The Human Condition*** is the debut studio album by Jon Bellion, released through Visionary Music Group and Capitol Records on June 10, 2016. It peaked at number two on the *Billboard* US Vinyl Albums.

## Synopsis

Having already penned hits for superstars, Bellion takes a major solo turn. The Human Condition is an alternately beautiful and banging set of pure, modern pop that finds the Long Island singer/songwriter (and author of Eminem and Rihanna's "Monster") tackling heady subject matter in relatable terms. He channels the soothing bedside manner of Ben Gibbard on the velvety, hip-hop-informed soft-rock of "80's Film," and enlists the same choir that backed MJ on 1987's "Man in the Mirror" for "Hand of God"—an ethereal, gospel-pop finale that detonates like fireworks in space.

## Background

He explained how the title came to be, "If you think about the phrase "the human condition," what is that? It's the condition all humans have, which is the classic pride, shame, all these different things. If you listen to the album, the album's really built on vulnerability. Everything I'm saying are not necessarily things that make me look great. [..] With Instagram and Twitter, we put out this fake vibe that our lives are perfect and we're great, amazing, perfect, 10/10 people all the time. I just want to let that album bring it light." Similarly, he said in an interview that the LP served as "an urge to expose [his] vulnerability," where people could relate and listen.

When asked why the single "Woodstock (Psychedelic Fiction)" did not make it on the album, he explained that it didn't fit with the album's concept, where it was something "that we all deal with," essentially "the human condition." For the change in the middle of "All Time Low," he explained, "When I first was making the record, about 10 minutes in, I knew I wanted to include it no matter what, no matter how long it took to get to radio or whatever. I just wanted to refurbish it and juice it up a little bit and just polish it off." The track that was most challenging for him to write was "Guillotine," while his most meaningful he considered was "Hand of God."

## Artwork

The album artwork was done by David Ardinaryas Lojaya, which consisted of pieces for each of the tracks. Bellion told *KnockTurnal*, "To me, I can describe [my sound] by saying "J-Dilla makes a Pixar movie." Long story short, this album is basically—it's one of my dreams forever to score an entire Pixar film. You know, like *The Incredibles* or something like that because they're my favorite kind of movies. So this entire album rollout, I've looked to the visual development artist named David Lojaya. He's from Indonesia, and he's worked for the past six or seven months on making scenes from a movie people will never see. So all these cool pictures and artwork that you see are themed from the movie, "The Human Condition," which is a pretend Pixar movie. Long story short, my debut album is basically just a business plan to present to Pixar in real life, to prove to them that I could possibly score one of their films. So when Jon Lasseter or, you know, all these different people at Pixar see these images, they're gonna go, "Hey, that's not our movie. What is it?" And then maybe they'll be like, "Wow, this kid is dedicated, he's projecting this business plan through his debut album, that's a smart idea."

In another interview, he told *The Aquarian* how he met Lojaya: "I contacted about 20 animators; some from Pixar, some from video game companies, all different places. Long story short, they all denied me. At the time, all I wanted was an album cover. I wanted the really deep, Pixar-looking album cover. I want to score a Pixar movie. So, I just wanted a cover originally, but nobody had the time to do it. The last guy on my list was David. I just basically emailed him and I was like, "Hey, might not know me, but I know you're in Indonesia. My name is Jon Bellion, I'm working on an album and I would love to do an artwork campaign with you." He was totally down. I sent him the album and he loved it. He ended up sending me the album cover, which I'm sure you've seen, and I was so blown away by it so much, that it just sparked this entire campaign in my head. I was like, "Oh my God, we should have three recurring characters—young Jon, current Jon, and the old Jon. We should have a woman who is throughout all the things, and she should be the muse, and she should be the inspiration behind the album. There should always be a beatpad because that's what I used to work on the album." So I approached David and I was like, "How would you like to make album covers or movie posters for every single song on the album?" He was totally down."

## References

1. ↑ Setaro, Shawn (June 22, 2016). "Jon Bellion: From Pop Songs to Pixar". *Forbes*.
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Ciccone, Rachael (July 27, 2016). "An Interview with Jon Bellion: The Secrets He Tells Us, We'll Take to the Grave". *The Aquarian*.
3. ↑ Kim, Eri (May 27, 2016). "Exclusive: Jon Bellion talks Pixar, Hip-Hop & 'The Human Condition'". *The KnockTurnal*.