Rex Orange County on Soft Boy Tendencies, Wristwatch Satiation, and Not Giving a Damn

Rex Orange County (or also known by his government name, Alex O'Connor) was my bright-eyed high school student, the archetype for vulnerable guitar guy music you ought to learn and emulate as an aspiring bedroom artist.

It was even harder to believe that he was just a year older than me, as he was already rubbing shoulders with the likes of hip-hop and fashion visionary Tyler, The Creator, and the icon Pharrell Williams.

"Loving is Easy," "Pluto Projector," "Sunflower," and "Best Friend" are what you likely know him from since they are the prototypical indie pop anthems that likely ended up in your playlist during that era of music. But since his explosion onto the scene with his breakthrough records Apricot Princess (2017) and Pony (2019), he's racked up a pretty potent catalog of albums consisting of Who Cares? (2022) and Alexander Technique (2024), where he expands his philosophies on melodies and romance.

Esquire Philippines had a pretty laid-back conversation with Mr. County at his hotel a day before his solo show in Manila organized by Wilbros under the Lalalafest rollout, his second Philippine show since 2023.

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Unsurprisingly, O'Connor said the wonky, guitar-psychedelic sensibilities of one Mac DeMarco were his gateway into putting a bunch of sounds together and riffing melodies over them.

DeMarco, the Canadian jangly-pop wizard, is widely seen as a pioneer of this DIY movement of bedroom-pop, camel-smoking musicians.

O'Connor cited "Still Together" as a DeMarco song he still revisits because of how straightforward it is compared to the usual crazy chromatic chords heard in other cuts.

He started guitar at fifteen and learned about five or six chords before he jumped straight into writing an album.

For years now, the English singer has been seen as the de facto poster boy for the wave of soft boy and bedroom pop music in the 2015-2019 era dominated by the likes of Still Woozy, boy pablo, Phum Viphurit, and even Clairo.

He told us that he never really labeled himself as such but that he was just expressing his experiences with unrequited love and his emotional self at the time.

"I never intended to do anything that was particularly masculine or not. I think it just was—I'm someone that was pretty emotional in my real life and sensitive in my real life. So I suppose it came naturally," the musician told us in the interview.

"I never call myself that phrase, but it makes sense, and I gravitate towards artists that do a similar thing."

It takes a certain level of confidence and maturity to tap into emotional directness and coating it in music that doesn't take itself too seriously.

This is best illustrated in his most accessible and most diverse-sounding record, Who Cares? which is the most potent form and refined form of his cozy, uplifting style.

"Who actually cares? Like, who even gives a shit? It's just music at the end of the day. We're not saving lives. Which I do believe. But then it means a lot to me. So it's a balance," according to O'Connor.

Songs like "Amazing," "One in a Million," are devotional romance executed perfectly without the cringe-inducing pandering that a lot of artists are guilty of.

His latest record, Alexander Technique, is vastly different in tone, as it is more of a developed and more introspective iteration of his solo guitar-driven music that birthed "Corduroy Dreams," now with a more intimate relationship with the ivories and his '70s gospel influences on his sleeve.

He had also teamed up with fellow Brit and musical savant James Blake, who has been on a tear lately on his run of crafting beautifully dissonant and atmospheric records.

"Who Cares? is very AB, AB," he says. "Alexander Technique is like the whole alphabet. Just whatever," O'Connor said.

On the day we spoke with Mr. County, he dropped the Beatles-inspired acoustic ballad "Indecision" with Daniel Caesar, which both contemplate ending relationships they are unsure about, a duet of romantically anxious musicians that follows last year's double single, "Rearrange My World / There's a Field (That's Only Yours)."

To us, it is reminiscent of stuff from Bread and that era of songwriters from the 1970s who told compelling musings and stories about hiccups in love.

The singer said he's working on a new album that hinges on being more concise, linear, and more like his earlier albums that centered on one story and a streamlined topic.

"It's a few more metaphors," he says. "The writing is a little more obscured. Not so like, this is what's going on. But very clear at the same time."

The reach of his music also continues to baffle him to this day, since people have come up to him to thank him for changing their lives or helping them through hard times through music.

"I find it baffling that it could possibly change someone's life, but I've heard it enough times to feel genuine gratitude when someone says it," the singer reflected.

"I love when someone's like, 'Yeah, you helped me through school.' Because I'm like, 'I feel that. I used to listen to music to get me through the day.'"

An intriguing discovery we made on O'Connor is that he's really been into baroque music and string ballads and has been on a words-first approach to new material with his obsession with poetry.

He's all about the finest songwriters around and those like Bob Dylan who paved the way for transformative wordsmithing.

"Bob Dylan has 55 albums. I'm a fan, but I can't say I'm a real fan without having gone and studied. So there's a lot of music for me to still delve into," he cheerfully geeked out.

We also often ask musicians who they have on their Mount Rushmore based on their bodies of work that are both enjoyable and poignant.

Here's a rundown of who he views in the highest regard within the realm of musicianship and songwriting: Stevie Wonder, Billy Joel, D'Angelo, Benny Sings, Lana Del Rey, and Phoebe Bridgers, though the mountain's size is subject to expansion.

"Right now I've just been on this lyrics-first thing: what's being said, why is it interesting, why is it being said that way?"

The Cartier Skeleton Crash

It was a breath of fresh air for us when he mentioned that he also puts on pristine outfits inside his house with no one there to appreciate his choices, as O'Connor is known for his loose, cozy, skateboarder-adjacent aesthetic.

"There's a difference between loving fashion and loving clothes. I love how things sit. How something fits in the shape of it."

"Initially I thought it was weird to like, show off or something. And then after a while I was like, I have all these clothes that I like. I should probably just stop and be more honest with the style.

Our horology-related neurons also lit up when he mentioned his reformed obsession with watches and how he finally scratched the final itch when he finally copped the coveted Cartier Crash, which his buddy Tyler, The Creator, also is known for also showing an affinity for.

"People talk about having their grail watch. I honestly felt like I have this now."

"I'm getting more and more into vintage. Less and less into super branded things. Just Japanese-American workwear. Denim. The history of it," O'Connor said.

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