Photo: Sean Martin
Us the Duo is wrapping up 2021 the best way they know how: with music.
Sean Martin
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“This year has actually been a really fun year for music, and ironically it’s all from TikTok,” Michael says. Of course, that has made putting together their music medley a bit challenging as a lot of the music popularized on TikTok this past year wasn’t actually from 2021. “It’s made making this [year’s medley] particularly tough because we try to honor the top hits [from the past year]. But songs like ‘Meet Me at Our Spot’ came out in 2020 or’Beggin'' came out in 2017, so we’re like, ‘Dang, we can’t put that in there.’ So it’s been a puzzle trying to piece it all together.”
Having gotten their own start on Vine, Michael and Carissa know first-hand thepower of social media in the music industry.
“It’s been really inspiring to open up TikTok and see artists using the platform to get their music heard,” Michael says. “It does remind me a lot of Vine, but bigger. TikTok feels like it has a bigger reach and it’s so music-focused, [whereas] Vine was a lot of comedy. Even in comedy skits on TikTok, there’s usually a song playing in the background, so music is the backdrop.”
Trae Patton/NBC
Taking a page fromTaylor Swift’s book, Us the Duo announced they have plans to re-record some of their biggest songs next year.
“Our 10-year wedding anniversaryis in April of next year so we want to put together a project that revamps some of the old songs, and then write some new ones. We’re going to start working on that at the top of the new year,” Michael says.
“We are in the works of collaborating with an artist who is very large in their country, the top streaming artist in their country actually, to be on that same project,” Michael adds. “So our plan is to then tour to that country and push the album around the same time. We can’t quite reveal it yet, but we can say this will be our first official collab. We’ve never really done features before, so [we’re] excited to enter into that world with Us the Duo.”
As for what the next 5 to 10 years will hold for Us the Duo, Michael and Carissa hope to keep doing things that make them happy.
“I feel like I’m living the dream right now,” Carissa says. “We live in a place that we love. We’re having so much fun as a little family. Xyla is delightful. She’s always surprising us and keeps things really fun. I’m excited to make more memories as a family.”
Michael adds, “It took a lot of work to get here just internally. Making choices along the way of doing things that bring us joy every day. We love what we do with our music and for work, and we just want to keep doing that every day that we possibly can. So if in 5 to 10 years from now we’re still doing this. That’s all we can hope for.”
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source: people.com
