Planningtorock - Planningtochanel (2x12")

Fashion commissions often fade once the runway lights go down, but Planningtorock’s PlanningtoChanel sticks around. Built for Chanel’s Métiers d’art 2019/20 show in Paris and released in 2020, it’s a concise, mood-rich set that turns the catwalk brief into something intimate you can live with. Jam Rostron has always balanced body and heart, and here the proportions tilt toward the cinematic. The beats are measured, the strings glow, and the whole thing moves with the unhurried confidence of a model hitting their mark, then gliding past.

Planningtorock’s records tend to smudge lines between chamber drama and club architecture. PlanningtoChanel nudges that blend toward orchestration, mostly setting the signature pitch-shifted vocals aside in favor of space, texture, and patience. You hear it in the way the low end cushions rather than slams, how a simple bass throb becomes a pulse for layered strings and subtle synth pads to breathe over. The pieces feel through-composed rather than hook-driven, yet they’re not shy about release. Crescendos bloom, then fall back to a warm purr, like the room taking a collective breath between looks.

There’s a quiet thrill in listening without the visuals. The score was designed for arcs, so you get graceful builds that never hurry, little runways within the tracks. It’s also unmistakably Planningtorock. The harmonic choices lean bittersweet, strings often voicing chords that push toward uplift but keep a shade of melancholy. When percussion steps up, it does so with purpose, a sparse kick pattern anchoring swelling arrangements. It’s dance-adjacent music, not a dance record, and that in-between is where Rostron excels.

Fans of Powerhouse will clock an emotional throughline. Where that album wore its healing on its sleeve, PlanningtoChanel translates that tenderness into poise. It feels like variations and excerpts reframed for a new context, less the confessional and more the cinematic reflection after the fact. You can put it on and let it tint a room, then notice, ten minutes in, how carefully the layers have shifted. That craft is what separates a quick soundtrack job from a keeper.

The Chanel connection matters beyond the headline. Rostron’s long project of queering pop and carving space for trans and nonbinary joy has often worked against the stiffness of institutions. Hearing that sensibility occupy a luxury house’s runway is its own quiet statement. The music doesn’t bend to become glossy filler. It brings care and emotional specificity to a setting that can default to sheen. There’s power in that restraint.

If you collect Planningtorock vinyl, this sits beautifully alongside All Love’s Legal and Powerhouse, the trio charting a path from political chant to personal repair to couture-scale atmosphere. PlanningtoChanel is a shorter listen, which only adds to its replay charm. I’ve looped it while writing, while cooking, while staring out a window waiting for rain. It’s one of those releases you keep reaching for when a room needs color, not clutter.

Now, about wax. PlanningtoChanel vinyl would make so much sense, given how string-led and tactile these recordings feel. If a pressing surfaces, grab it. In the meantime, anyone looking to buy Planningtorock records online will find plenty of strong options, and you won’t regret adding more Planningtorock albums on vinyl to the shelf. Record store regulars know the thrill, whether you’re digging in a neighborhood spot or scrolling a trusted shop that ships fast, even across the pond to folks hunting vinyl records Australia wide. I’ve recommended this EP to customers who come in for contemporary classical crossovers, and to club heads who want something to set a mood before guests arrive.

As a listen, the EP lands with critics and fans for the same reason: it’s specific. No bloated climaxes, no borrowed tropes, just smart arranging, a patient sense of movement, and that unmistakable Planningtorock chord language that lifts you a few inches off the ground. Runway scores aren’t supposed to have this much inner life. PlanningtoChanel does, and it quietly strengthens the case for Rostron as one of the most distinctive arrangers working at the seam where pop, contemporary composition, and club culture meet. Even apart from the show that birthed it, this is a record worth living with, a soft-spoken flex that lingers long after the last look clears.