Discovering Chace: The Sound of Stillness in a World That Moves Too Fast
There are songs that feel like skin. Not in the flesh-and-blood sense, but in the way they wrap around your body before you even realize you’re cold. That’s what happened the first time I heard Chace’s Keep Me Warm. It was late, and I was tired in the way you can only be when you’ve lied to everyone all day by saying, “I’m fine.” The silence in my apartment was louder than usual, as if it, too, was tired of my excuses. And so, I did what all chronically online romantics do: I opened my favorite music app and typed in something like “songs that feel like a hug.” I didn’t find a playlist. I found Chace.
Not the TikTok sensation of the week. Not the Spotify algorithm’s golden child. Chace, a soft-voiced singer-producer from Shanghai who somehow makes electronic music feel like a handwritten note. A message folded twice, slipped into your locker, and scented with someone else’s bravery.
Which is to say: he’s emerging. Technically, sure, you could argue he’s already made it. He’s signed to BMG. He’s opened for Anderson .Paak. He’s played festivals where the bass lines hit harder than the jet lag. But in the emotional sense? In the cultural sense? He’s still in that delicious middle place. The part where you find an artist who isn’t yet trying to sell you anything except sincerity. He’s still a secret. The kind you want to tell only the people you trust.
Anti-People Pleaser, his most recent EP, is not just a title. It’s a quiet manifesto. In an industry that demands its artists be either saviors or spectacles, Chace chooses softness. The EP drifts in on a sigh and lingers like a confession. Each track feels like it was meant for late-night drives and early-morning showers. Music made not for the club, but for the moment you leave it.
But there is rhythm. Don’t get it twisted. This isn’t sad boy R&B in the usual sense. Chace knows his way around a groove. Tunnel Vision bounces with the kinetic energy of a heart that just realized it still works. It’s funky without trying to be retro, modern without being sterile. There’s a bit of Pharrell in his cadence. A bit of Toro y Moi in his textures. And a whole lot of something entirely his own.
In a landscape of artists who seem to yell louder to be heard, Chace whispers and somehow it cuts deeper. His music doesn’t beg for virality. It simply exists, waiting patiently for the listener who needs it most. And when that moment comes, it doesn’t feel like discovery. It feels like reunion. That’s the thing about Chace. He doesn’t make music for everyone. He makes music for anyone who’s ever felt like they’re too much and not enough at the same time. For anyone who was told they were too sensitive, too soft, too complicated. For those of us who process heartbreak like a spreadsheet and joy like a prayer.
I could list the stats. Tell you about his stint as a teen DJ prodigy. Mention the praise from Apple Music, COLORS, and SXSW. But that feels like bringing math to a poem. Chace is an atmosphere, a feeling you walk into like a room you forgot you loved. And what a room it is. Sonically, his work feels curated but not cold. Lyrics like, “Do not go gentle into goodbyes” make you sit up straighter, make you check your phone even though you know no one’s texted. There’s a precision in his vulnerability, the kind that doesn’t scream pain but outlines it gently, like a pencil sketch of a bruise.
He is a global artist. Not in the way publicists mean when they say it to sound inclusive. But truly. Chace embodies the duality of being both rooted and borderless. His sound pulls from Western R&B, French house, Korean synth pop, and something distinctly Shanghainese. He doesn’t just translate genres, he reinterprets them. Which makes sense. Because being “emerging” doesn’t just mean new. It means becoming. Chace is becoming something. Not chasing the charts or the clout or the co-signs. But chasing clarity. Chasing connection.
And isn’t that what we all want? To feel like our insides make sense in someone else’s song? To press play and feel seen? Chace offers that without demanding anything in return. No viral dance challenge. No merch drop. Just a boy, a beat, and a voice that feels like it was written in lowercase. So yes. Chace is emerging. But more importantly: he is necessary. For the quiet kids. The in-between kids. The ones who haven’t figured it all out and are okay with saying so out loud.
He is not the answer to a trend. He is the question we forgot to ask: what happens when you make music just to feel more human? I don’t know how long he’ll stay in this space. Maybe next year, he’ll be opening for The Weeknd or topping Billboard. But for now, for this moment, he belongs to us. The ones who still believe in the slow burn. The ones who need songs that feel like skin.
Look, I’m just trying to put y’all onto some music that don’t lie to you.
Find Chace here: @Chace | Spotify
