After School EP,[1][2] sometimes referred to as exclusively After School, is the fourth official extended play by Melanie Martinez. It was released on September 25th, 2020, by Atlantic Records through digital download, vinyl, and CD. The extended play is also featured on streaming platforms as a deluxe edition of K-12.
On December 17th, 2020, Melanie performed six tracks (all excluding "Notebook") from After School during the CAN'T WAIT TILL I'M OUT OF K-12 virtual concert.
Background[]
In an interview with V Magazine, Melanie stated that she would release songs that were in-line with K-12, but were "more personal and more vulnerable."
When the K-12 Tour began, fans began to speculate that Melanie would be releasing an extended play because the image displayed on the video screen during when Melanie performed "Fire Drill" would show a pink composition notebook with "After School" written on the front.[3]
On December 6th, 2019, during the concert at O2 City Hall in Newcastle, England, Melanie announced that "Fire Drill" would be officially released at some point in 2020. It was later confirmed through Melanie's Instagram story that the song would be a track on After School.
On January 20th, 2020, and January 21st, 2020, fans reported hearing Melanie rehearsing an unknown song, now confirmed to be "Test Me" and "Numbers". However, she did not perform any of these songs during her concerts.[4][5][6]
On February 6th, 2020, an interview was released where Melanie stated that she intended to release "Fire Drill" by the end of the month. "Fire Drill's" release was later pushed to June 26th, 2020, because of "Play Date's" popularity on TikTok. She also scrapped one track from the extended play,[7] although she later confirmed in a Beats 1 interview that the extended play would remain with seven tracks.[8]
On February 9th, 2020, Melanie confirmed through her Instagram story that the extended play would be out in spring, but it was later pushed back, and that a song featuring "one of [her] favorite artists" would be coming out "sooner than you think".[9] The next day, on February 10th, 2020, she released "Copy Cat" featuring Tierra Whack.
On August 31st, 2020, Melanie posted on Instagram and liked a comment theorizing the release being sometime during Libra season, which goes from September 23rd to October 22nd. This had lead fans to theorize whether she is hinting at a release around that time. [citation needed]
Then, on September 15th, 2020, Melanie posted a surrealist photo of her in a giant nest with two eggs on Instagram, with a caption reading, "Holdin’ onto these eggs till they're ready to be hatched next week.", causing fans to believe that the extended play would be released the following week.[10]
On September 22nd, 2020, Melanie posted a snippet of "The Bakery" on her TikTok. She later announced that the music video for "The Bakery" would be out at 12AM EST on September 25th, 2020.[11]
The EP was officially released on September 25th, 2020, along with the music video for "The Bakery".
In an interview with Idolator, Melanie expressed interest in making a music video for "Test Me", saying that she wrote a video treatment and that "it all depends on how much people connect with it/stream [the song]." However, she later confirmed on her Instagram Livestream that she didn't have enough budget to film the "Test Me" music video. She also stated she wanted to spend more time working on her second feature film and third studio album.
An exclusive vinyl of the EP with a forest green and grape marble design was released on December 15th, 2023. On, November 2nd, 2023, the vinyl was made available for fans in the United Kingdom. The vinyl became available for fans in the United States on November 17th, 2023.
Later, a vinyl variant with an orchid splatter design was released on January 5th, 2024. This version of the vinyl was available for pre-order on November 24th, 2023.
Theme[]
According to Melanie, the EP follows the story elements that are present in her sophomore album, K-12; however, the songs are more personal to Melanie rather than relating to her character, Cry Baby.
Track list[]
There are 7 tracks on the CD, as well as serves as 7 additional on the deluxe version for K-12. There are currently 20 songs that were intended for After School EP, but only some of them made the final cut (11 tracks are unreleased, 2 tracks are released).
There is both an explicit version of the album and a clean version. The EP contains five explicit songs and two non-explicit songs. This is Melanie's most explicit extended play.
- 🅴 indicates the song is explicit, but also has a clean version.
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Producer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Notebook" 🅴 | Martinez, Michael Keenan | Keenan | 2:31 |
| 2. | "Test Me" | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 2:55 |
| 3. | "Brain & Heart" | Martinez, Keenan, Fred Jerkins III, Jennifer Lopez, LaShawn Daniels, Mark Rooney, Rodney Jerkins | Keenan | 3:24 |
| 4. | "Numbers" 🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 4:40 |
| 5. | "Glued" 🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 3:13 |
| 6. | "Field Trip" 🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 3:01 |
| 7. | "The Bakery" 🅴 | Martinez, Blake Slatkin | Slatkin | 2:33 |
Indicated from the original files, After School EP had a slightly different track listing position and track lengths.
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Producer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Notebook" 🅴 | Martinez, Michael Keenan | Keenan | 2:34 |
| 2. | "Test Me" | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 2:53 |
| 3. | "Brain & Heart" | Martinez, Keenan, Fred Jerkins III, Jennifer Lopez, LaShawn Daniels, Mark Rooney, Rodney Jerkins | Keenan | 3:25 |
| 4. | "Numbers" 🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 4:40 |
| 5. | "Field Trip"🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 3:00 |
| 6. | "Glued" 🅴 | Martinez, Keenan | Keenan | 3:12 |
| 7. | "The Bakery" 🅴 | Martinez, Blake Slatkin | Slatkin | 2:33 |
Cut songs[]
Main article: List of unreleased songs
Key[]
- Bold typing indicates that the song has been fully leaked online or officially released.
- Italic typing indicates that the song was never released and has yet to leak fully online.
List[]
- "Absorb"
- "Copy Cat" (released as a stand-alone single)
- "Erase Her"
- "Fire Drill" (released as a stand-alone single)
- "Function"
- "History"
- "Lost & Found"
- "Maze"
- "Oh No!"
- "Paper Cut"
- "Spin The Bottle"
- "Trophy"
- "Under The Desk"
Music video[]
| No. | Title | Release Date | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "The Bakery" | September 25th, 2020 | 2:40 |
Gallery[]
These are promotional animations used as Spotify canvases. All of them were created by French artist Loris Dahmane.
Q&A[]
On January 8th, 2020, Melanie did a Q&A regarding the extended play on her Instagram stories. The Q&A can be found below.
On July 24th, 2020, Melanie did a second Q&A regarding the EP on her Instagram story about the tracks. The Q&A can be found below.
.png "Q&A Track 1 (1).png (272 KB)")
Trivia[]
- "Notebook" is the only song from the EP that has never once been performed live.
- "Glued" and "Field Trip" were almost cut before Melanie decided to keep them. [citation needed]
- Originally, Melanie scrapped a song, likely either "Copy Cat" or "Fire Drill", leaving the extended play with six tracks, as she thought seven tracks were "too much for an EP".[7] However, she later stated in an interview with Beats 1 that the extended play would have seven tracks again, as she wrote a new song on February 24th, 2020, which replaced the removed song.[8]
- The new song was later confirmed to be "The Bakery".
- One of the songs was confirmed to be about a breakup. The song was later confirmed to be "Notebook".
- Melanie planned to make music videos for multiple songs on this project. Originally, Melanie was additionally going to make a music video for the song "Play Date" as a result of the song's rising popularity on TikTok, but she chose to create a music video for "The Bakery" instead.
- Melanie also confirmed in an interview with Idolator that she had already written a video treatment for "Test Me", which was going to be her favorite.
- Melanie has revealed that her favorite lyrics from the extended play are from "Brain & Heart".[13]
- "The Bakery" is produced by Blake Slatkin, being the only track on the extended play not produced by Michael Keenan.
- "Notebook" is the shortest track on After School EP, with the song length at 2:31.
- "Numbers" is the longest track on After School EP, with the song length at 4:39.
- "Brain & Heart" and "Test Me" are the only non-explicit songs on the EP.
- The extended play debuted at #74 on Billboard Hot 200.
- "The Bakery" is the only song on the extended play that received a music video.
- In an interview with The Knockturnal, Melanie revealed the meaning behind the cover.
- The bubblegum is a symbolic ode to the end scene of K-12 where Cry Baby and Ben blow spit bubbles.
- She wanted to be sitting at a desk because she feels like After School EP is more so about the real-life lessons she has learned and been applying to her life. So she wanted it to feel like she was sitting at a desk, absorbing what life had to teach her.
- Her cut off head is symbolic for what it feels like when you are learning such challenging things in life. "You feel like a chicken with your head cut off scrambling to find the solutions to the issues at hand."
- "History" was the first scrapped song to be leaked from the extended play. This song was present in an early After School draft, it's unknown why it was removed from the EP.
- "The Bakery" does not have a Spotify animation canvas as it features the music video.
- The back cover was shot at Los Angeles Color Space Studio, as well as the other promotional photoshoots.
References[]
- ↑ https://melanie.lnk.to/AfterSchool
- ↑ https://open.spotify.com/album/75sm9IEmN01J5MsyZr4Cw1
- ↑ File:After School EP.png
- ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/B7jlAz_FX2s/?igshid=1o7k3avxrakk5
- ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/B7jnrXEFaFT/?igshid=5qlpkx6byqoy
- ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/B7lx1J6Ffe_/?igshid=1n5r7cnj0uo2m
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 https://twitter.com/lunchboxfriend/status/1225559721643577344
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 https://twitter.com/beats1/status/1265053529674309632?s=21
- ↑ File:83682722_638673300215580_7090900590978019342_n.jpg
- ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/CFKncxRDuNP/?utm_medium=copy_link
- ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/CFh30NSDAPg/?utm_medium=copy_link
- ↑ https://www.idolator.com/7914846/interview-melanie-martinez-talks-after-school-ep?ios=1&safari=1&Exc_TM_LessThanPoint001_p1=1&andro=1&chrome=1
- ↑ https://twitter.com/martinezmcharts/status/1283632684900724736
- ↑ File:Myfavsongontheep.png
[]
v • e  | |
|---|---|
| Featured tracks | Notebook • Test Me • Brain & Heart • Numbers • Glued • Field Trip • The Bakery |
| Scrapped tracks | Absorb • Copy Cat (ft. Tierra Whack) • Erase Her • Fire Drill • Function • History • Lost & Found • Maze • Oh No! • Paper Cut • Spin The Bottle • Trophy • Under The Desk |
| Characters | Abuelita • Bunnies |
| Producers | Blake Slatkin • Melanie Martinez (exec.) • Michael Keenan |
| Related | Promotional photoshoots • K-12 • CAN'T WAIT TILL I'M OUT OF K-12 • Merchandise |
