Pick of the Week: Sam Fender “Getting Started”

By Tatum Jenkins, Music Coordinator

Sam Fender puts his hardships behind him for one night and rocks out on “Getting Started.”

THE BACKSTORY TO “GETTING STARTED”

Fender has lots of material with his unconventional childhood and adolescence. His parents divorced when he was eight, and he lived with his father until he was seventeen and his stepmother kicked him out. While living with his mother, she retired from being a nurse because of her fibromyalgia, and Fender quickly took on a more adult role. He quit school and began working two jobs – one at a restaurant and another at a pub. This song is an ode to the nights he wanted to be eighteen and feel like a teenager, going out with friends and embracing whatever the night threw at him.

THE FUN-SPIRITED MUSIC VIDEO

While the song itself is an upbeat, exhilarating adventure of sound on its own, the music video only adds to the fun. It follows a group of four guys getting ready to go out, showing off a really interesting filming technique that I won’t spoil for you here. In the video, Fender also has a character standing in for his mother. We see shots of a woman in a nurse uniform leaving for work for a night shift as her son goes out with his friends. It’s Fender’s imagined reality of being eighteen: his mother continuing to work as a nurse uninhibited by her disorder and him living a carefree teenagehood.

HOW SAM FENDER IS TRULY ONLY GETTING STARTED

This song and his second album Seventeen Going Under are only the beginning of Fender’s career. Seventeen Going Under was nominated for the Mercury Prize (an award given to the best album released in the UK) among many other awards. 

His touring reflects his success too. He’s supporting Florence and the Machine on part of her tour in the United States. The two will take on TD Garden on September 14th in Boston. He’s also playing two big shows at St. James Park in London next summer— something he has called a lifelong dream of his.

Every Monday, our music staff brings you a new Pick of The Week, detailing some of our favorite songs. Check out our previous Picks of the Week here, and make sure to tune in to WERS 88.9FM!