i give my friends flowers- pollen (Music Video Premiere & Album Teaser)

Set to release on August 21st, Jacob Klein better known as, i give my friends flowers, continues to tease his upcoming sophomore album, DOGSTAR 1, with the premiere of the official music video for the projects focus track, "pollen", right here on RDFO. While some albums feel carefully assembled, others feel discovered along the way and Klein's new 12-track album feels like the latter. Growing up between his father's hi-fi audio shop and his mother's garden, i give my friends flowers has taken his life experiences and created a sound that feels as homegrown as it does polished.

Immersed in music since a young age, Klein began making records at just 10 years old, and by high school, he was touring and opening for acts like Mac Miller, Selena Gomez, and Maroon 5. His early successes undoubtedly helped to fan the flame with his music career, later going on to study at Duquesne and Belmont, under an impressive collection of songwriters and recording professionals, including Jules Shear and Larry Crane.

While Klein moved on and continued to stay busy working behind the scenes as a producer and engineer helping shape other people's records, i give my friends flowers was born as a way to properly express his own creative ideas and vision. Since launching his solo project, Klein has carved out a lane of his own that blurs the lines between indie soul, dream pop, lo-fi folk, and alternative hip-hop. Hard to generalize, quantify and/or compare, i give my friends flowers feels totally authentic and original, which goes a long way in a world full of cookie cutter creators and clout chasing copycats.

Throughout his new project, Klein's ear for atmosphere and his commitment to songwriting always sit center stage, however the circumstances surrounding his DOGSTAR 1 give the album a considerable amount of emotional context. While living in Asheville his life was disrupted by Hurricane Helene, but that was just one of many major life events that helped to spark the creation of his new album. Faced with the loss of friends, the responsibility of caring for his grandfather, the death of his dog, and the collapse of a long-term relationship, Klein took those hardships and turned them into something abstract and imaginative. The album imagines a world that resembles our own but is subtly, almost imperceptibly, different — a kind of alternate reality where familiar people and places remain recognizable while something fundamental has shifted. A dog responds to the wrong name. A familiar house doesn't feel quite right. A moment seems to have happened before. Eventually, the changes aren't just happening around you; they're happening to you.

It is an intriguing concept for a record about grief and transformation because it captures something that straightforward storytelling often misses. After a major loss or life-changing event, the world can look exactly as it did before while feeling completely unfamiliar. DOGSTAR 1 understands that contradiction.

Leading up to the full album release, i give my friends flowers has blessed fans with the first six songs, nicely packed as an EP of its own titled, A River Runs Through Me, helping to give listeners an advanced look at the sonic and emotional territory that he has curated across DOGSTAR 1. “Pollen,” which led that release, provides an especially effective introduction, while the remaining songs gradually expand the project's palette. Rather than treating the EP as six isolated singles, Klein allows the songs to communicate with one another, creating a sense of forward motion even when the arrangements become hazy or reflective.

While fans have yet to hear the album's focus track, “VOICES”, I can assure you it is one of the projects most memorable moments. What makes “VOICES”, especially effective is the way it approaches memory as something active rather than something safely contained in the past. The people we've lost, the relationships we've outgrown, and the versions of ourselves we've left behind can continue influencing the present. Throughout the project, there are references to absence and change, but the music is never overwhelmed by them. Thanks to his penchant for sound design and production, there is always a sense of reprieve that lies amongst the melodies and arrangements, adding a dreamlike quality without sacrificing the songs poignancy.

The album's atmosphere does much of the work, surrounding the songwriting with a sense of intimacy and unease that perfectly portrays the larger appeal of the propject. There's enough space in the arrangement for the listener to inhabit the song rather than simply observe it. For me, “VOICES” is one of the places where Klein's background as both songwriter and producer becomes especially evident.

Taking time to construct a sonic environment, while also allowing the emotional weight of each song to cut through, Klein creates music that sounds beautiful on the surface but reveals a whole lot more when you revel in the details of it all. DOGSTAR 1 has plenty of sonic texture, while Klein's production instincts put focus on capturing analog warmth, digital manipulation, organic instrumentation, and modern effects that coexist without cluttering.

The accompanying, “pollen”, music video adds another dimension to that world. Created, directed, and animated by Chase Hudson, the visual follows Jacob and Sparrow as an unknown force moves them through different dimensions, thresholds, and doorways toward something resembling their true forms. Inspired in part by the films of Richard Linklater and the storytelling of Haruki Murakami, the video feels like a natural extension of the album's fascination with altered realities and shifting identities.

That makes the timing of this premiere particularly fitting. “pollen” isn't simply being presented alongside the album as another piece of promotional material; the visual helps illuminate the imaginative framework surrounding the music, where the search for a way back eventually becomes an acceptance that there may not be a single place to return to. Thematically, DOGSTAR 1 isn't arguing that change can be defeated, rather it almost suggests the opposite: change is the one constant, and fighting its existence may ultimately be less productive than learning how to live alongside of it.

Death, distance, and broken relationships are all unavoidable parts of life, but they aren't the final destination. Friends leave. People die. Places disappear. Relationships evolve. Even our understanding of ourselves can shift, but through it all, love remains important because everything else is temporary. There will always be value in choosing connection, making art, and paying attention while we're here.

At its core, DOGSTAR 1 is a cohesive and introspective collection of songs made by someone trying to make sense of what life has handed him. Klein has taken experiences that could easily have resulted in an overly solemn record and has instead built something heartfelt, curious, and emotionally open. The album has sadness in it, but also beauty, humor, mystery, and movement. It doesn't pretend that everything works out. It simply suggests that there can still be meaning in continuing.