Video: Loren Kramar, ‘Hollywood Blvd.’

Kevin Bronson on November 7th, 2023

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San Fernando Valley native Loren Kramar is a Cooper Union-schooled visual artist and writer whose musical exploits took a slow route to his latest achievement, signing to indie label Secretly Canadian.

Kramar was briefly thrust into the spotlight in 2015, when one of his early songs, “My Life,” was showcased by Apple Music at the company’s WWDC event. Official releases have been few since then, though in 2020 he released a group of singles (notably, “Cover Girl”) made in collaboration with Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor.

“Hollywood Blvd.” is his first release for Secretly, an extravagantly orchestrated opus faintly reminiscent of Nilsson and Cat Stevens and, considered with his self-directed video (featuring John Early and Amber Coffman of Dirty Projectors), boasting an absurdist streak Father John Misty wide. (Kramar’s press photo, though, just screams Dan Fogelberg.)

Much of Kramar’s work seems to revolve around the conceit of being an artist, and embracing it. “I am still unsure of how full of shit I am,” he said in a 2020 interview. “I’ve got to be full of shit to a degree, but if I am, I want that to be on display.”

Of the single, he says: “It is my crown jewel. It’s a song about aspiration in all its ridiculousness, and wanting to feel like you matter.”

The video, a send-up of Hollywood, stars Kramar on the precipice of receiving his coveted star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

“There’s almost a self-created fanfic that comes with imagining oneself as a star,” he says. “It’s a coping mechanism against insecurity and shame … that I am enough, that I have value as a person outside of being an artist.”

||| Watch: The video for “Hollywood Blvd.”