ETHAN FRENCH BACK WITH NEW TRACK “reckless and arranged – day 56 (extended)”
Last month, 25-year-old Australian artist Ethan French announced ideas of the day vol. 1— a wildly cool project born from an equally wild idea. Just eight months ago, the Perth native committed to posting an “Idea A Day” on social media: a brand-new piece of music, shared daily, no matter what. The results have been spectacular – 850K+ followers on Instagram alone, attention from artists like John Mayer, Justin Timberlake, Jon Batiste, Anderson .Paak, Tom Misch, SZA, and more, and an exemplary body of work distilled from this humble daily practice and love of creativity.
Last month, French gave fans a taste of the project with his track “it takes a lifetime – day 58.” He returns to an earlier entry, sharing an extended version of “reckless and arranged –day 56″, a track that’s already sparked a wave of online buzz and excitement from fans across the globe. In fact, it caught early attention & sparked remixes from artists like Kerri Chandler and T-Pain, who also opened his Red Rocks set with the remix this past June!
The song came to life back in May as a minute-long sketch, posted as part of French’s daily practice. But after a whirlwind of fan comments and millions of streams across platforms, he knew a full version was in order. Built around a dramatic piano melody, a soft beat, and moody vocals, the track’s intricate layers and earworm melody calls comparisons to artists like Radiohead and Tame Impala.
“This idea kinda changed my life,” shares French. “I was already incredibly excited (and surprised!) with how the series was being received, but the scale of support, cosigns, remixes and instrumental covers around this song have been unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. I woke up to a notification that “T-pain wants to collaborate on a reel,” and saw his remix – how do you even respond to that?! It’s pretty wild to see comments on random videos mentioning that someone else’s song reminds them of day 56, and stuff like that. It doesn’t even feel like it’s mine anymore, the internet owns it! The amount of people that have heard and shown support on this one is genuinely beyond my imagination.”
ideas of the day vol. 1 began as exactly that: an idea a day, shared with no bigger plan attached. Eight songs deep, all written, tracked, and mixed during that daily practice, the
collection moves between perspectives – some songs turn inward, others written about the people around him – with identity and the creative process as the thread that ties them together.
Growing up on the far west coast of Australia, Ethan French spent his childhood tinkering on guitars and mucking around with melodies, chasing sounds long before he had names for them. His relationship with music emerged quietly at home. His mother bought him a small keyboard at age four, and his father would noodle around on the guitar, playing Pink Floyd tunes. The tinkering turned into a passion, and at just 15, he won the prestigious Australian Children’s Music Foundation songwriting competition.
His mastery was hard-won, built entirely from scratch through feel and curiosity. Self-taught and obsessive, he still plays largely by ear. Growing up, his music teachers pleaded with him to attend formal theory classes, but he stubbornly insisted on learning by ear instead and he almost didn’t make it through high school music studies because of it. When he eventually studied composition at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA), he chose composition over formal piano performance, refusing what he calls “skill acquisition devoid of creation.” He felt the sounds first, and only later learned the formal language to name what he’d already played.
That instinct shaped how his ‘idea of the day’ series came together. “I get asked about how I came up with the idea and the truth is, I kind of stumbled into it,” French explains. He’d initially planned something lower-effort — a “chords of the day” video for musicians, a simple way to post consistently on social media. But after the first one, he realized it wasn’t fuelling his creativity the way he wanted, and pivoted to “idea of the day” instead. “I’ve always enjoyed making shorter, kind of ‘unfinished’ ideas and just putting them out there. I did a series of ‘song sketches’ a few years ago that’s a similar concept, without the daily thing. Sometimes people ask how I thought of it — but it’s not exactly a revolutionary concept!! I’m a musician, a creator, and I decided to create something and share it every day. It seems obvious in hindsight!” That same instinct carried through to how the project itself came together. “I think I’ve enjoyed the creative process on this project more than I ever have,” he says. “I’ve learned that when I place less pressure on each individual idea, it actually improves the quality of my writing. There’s a real risk of making things worse when you obsess over them for too long. I love tiny parts of songs and often dislike others — I’ll replay tiny snippets over and over. Run-time isn’t something that concerns me much. Even though a lot of these are ‘ideas’ and relatively short, I still think of them as standalone pieces of music.”
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