March Mellow from Por Vida by Castle Pines

Isolation and loneliness are the core themes of the new song ‘March Mellow’ by Castle Pines. Inspired by seeing Castle Pines drummer Sterling Fairfield spend months in the hospital and almost dying because of Crohn’s Disease, singer and lyricist Leandro Barrientos took their history together, beginning in garages and punk rock venues and expanded that into an abstract narrative reflecting a persons identity as they become older and irrelevant.

‘March Mellow’ is happy and morose at the same time, reflecting the past and present in a allegorical and cheeky play on words. Feeling distraught through a disingenuous social media, and seeking to find some semblance of connection, lines like “breaking backs inside the pit” and “wishing we had met” portray the recollections of times that seem shinier and brighter in retrospect. This demand for some sort of connection in a state of disenchantment is what fuels the social machine and we all feel it, and desire a need to belong to something more concrete than the vapid whirlwind of digital noise.

There is a concrete reference to the music venue the band grew up in Corona, CA the now defunct “Showcase Theater” where the band spent the majority of its youth watching bands and formulating their own musical tastes. It is to this promising past of vibrant art that the band now seethes with melancholic appreciation and longing. With the hospitalization of Sterling the band looked to these times as bastions of hope for a better tomorrow.

More on Crohn’s Disease and the bands struggle through that time here: https://cpporvida.com/new-blog/crohnsdisease

The song is playful and woeful in its composition, relying on simple chord structures with a hummable and memorable melody that sits on the top. The lyrics delve into the abstract and colorful, using metaphor with Greek and Roman names for planets to describe the insatiable need to connect all while feeling unlovable.

CP POR VIDA