Artists You Should Know: Vi City Reckons with Love’s Burns on New Music Video “Rearview” (feat. Kes Kross)

Vi City gives one last hard look at a volatile past relationship in the new music video for their song “Rearview” (feat. Kes Kross). It’s also the penultimate track of his soul-searching album Hotels and Heartbreaks, a collection that finds the rapper-songwriter and producer confronting painful introspections and retrospections on love.

“Rearview” and its accompanying film offer a vision of what any functioning and healthy relationship shouldn’t be. One that just devolves into two people angrily airing their grievances without sincere or honest communication — as well as a vacancy of empathy.

The result is a dismal portrait of bitterness and regret that Vi City explores with lucid sadness across the track’s lilting piano melody. While in between the dulcet vocals of Kes Kross illuminate the ways in which two people are thwarted in their attempts to get back to a more loving point in their relationship.

“This song is like an audio letter to that very situation,” Vi City explained. “It felt like nothing I said or felt mattered throughout that time. I tried to convey sincerity and my genuine thoughts in every way possible, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears. I reached a point of exhaustion from defending my truth and apologizing for past actions while feeling like a doormat. That’s just not who I am.”

The music video for “Rearview” furthers his descent into those sorrow-ridden moments when their own attempts to heal things through thankless acts of love were all they had. It was then that he turned to music to release these pent-up emotions that were being left to fester inside of him. Just as the film depicts them — as two striking silhouettes arguing against a bright red backdrop — the resentments that formed were far from one-sided.

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Accountability is always a hard pill to swallow but Vi City does so on “Rearview” in order to move forward and let go. The film adds a heart-wrenching visual dimension to watching a one-loving relationship descend into fierce arguments and harsh selfishness — a vicious cycle that plays out atop the immaculately white piano that sits in the center of the warehouse where the video was shot. Offering an unnervingly familiar illustration of a couple finding itself unable to reconcile with one another.

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Words: Steven Ward

Watch the music video for “Rearview” (feat. Kes Kross) from Vi City below!