Who, you say? He’s the extremely underrated bassist for the band Ride, who you may well remember because I often mention via their brilliant 1992 song “Leave Them Far Behind” or their recent reactivation over the last five years. While the two vocalist/guitarists from the band (Andy Bell and Mark Gardener) have both had impressive solo careers, Queralt remained in the background, only resurfacing a few years back with fellow bandmate, drummer Loz Colbert, on an instrumental side project called ID. He’s just dropped his first solo album, Swallow, in mid-June.
I admit I wasn’t sure what I was expecting with this record, but I was definitely not expecting what sounds frighteningly like a Lush album! Part of it of course is that Lush’s Emma Anderson — someone who’s also recently resurfaced with a solo project — joins on vocals for a handful of songs. The record definitely has that reverb-heavy feel to it, but interestingly has moments of Radiohead influence as well, such as the strange ambience of “Mission Creep” or the rattling noise of “Messengers”.
I’ve been returning to this one a lot lately, quickly earning a spot as a writing soundtrack!
Come one, come all for some free e-books! Smashwords and Draft2Digital are having their Summer/Winter Sale! ALL SEVEN of my books are here for free for the entirety of July! You know you want ’em!
Yes, this includes: —A Division of Souls (The Bridgetown Trilogy, Book 1) [2015]** —The Persistence of Memories (The Bridgetown Trilogy, Book 2) [2016] —The Balance of Light (The Bridgetown Trilogy, Book 3) [2017] —Meet the Lidwells! A Rock ‘n’ Roll Family Memoir[2018] —In My Blue World [2019] —Diwa & Kaffi [2023] —Queen Ophelia’s War[2024]
** NEWS! A Division of Souls will be re-released in ‘Remastered’ form for its tenth anniversary in September!
—Do you love an epic metaphysical sci-fi adventure? Try the Bridgetown Trilogy! —A big fan of music memoirs? Meet the Lidwells is a fictional nod to one of my favorite genres! —Enjoy magical girls and time travel fantasy? Try out In My Blue World! —In the mood for a nice Ghibli-esque hopepunk story about best friends? You’ll love Diwa & Kaffi! —Looking for a fantasy story about self-discovery?Queen Ophelia’s War is for you!
And who knows, maybe I’ll finally get Theadia on this list, once I finally finish the dang thing! Heh.
Some might have heard me talking about this before, but I find this kind of fascinating because I’m 99% certain I have auditory processing disorder. I haven’t been diagnosed by a doctor about it, but I would not be surprised if they agree. This short does kind of explain it a bit:
Now, I can hear you say: ‘wait, you, the person obsessed with listening to music, have a hearing problem?’ Well, it’s not a hearing problem. It’s a processing problem. I put it this way: if we’re in a crowded and noisy restaurant, it’s not that I’m deaf and can’t hear you. It’s that I can hear you. And the couple next to us. And the sound system that’s playing the music just a bit too loud. And the TV down the way that’s playing the game. And the bros constantly cheering at it. And if you’re not facing me while you speak, I lose the clarity of your voice. I hear all of it at the same levels, and my issue is that I have trouble filtering it so I can focus only on what you’re saying. [It’s also why I can’t wear a radio earbud at work, because I’d be too distracted by all the chatter on top of all the other noise within the store. I just use the radio the old fashioned way.]
I also often say I have shockingly sharp spatial hearing. I can easily tell which direction a noise originated no matter what direction I’m facing. It’s part of why I love music so much, especially if it’s a well-produced stereo mix. I’m sure if I had a surround-sound system it would be bliss, but also highly distracting. But it does have its plusses, in that I’m often more aware of my surroundings than other people are, that is if I’m not inundated by multiple other noises.
So yeah, I’m quite proud of being the age I’m at and still having relatively decent hearing, but APD does have its own drawbacks. I’ve just learned to work around it.
Interestingly, whenever I think of the 80s golden era of MTV’s 120 Minutes, I think of this song. It was one of the first videos I remember seeing when I started taping it on Sunday nights so I could watch it after school on Monday. It’s one of the first alternative rock songs I can think of that got more than light rotation on the channel outside of that show. If I recall, this video wasn’t actually on the first episode I’d taped but the last video just before the show started. Somehow it just hit me the right way just then and I was hooked. I remember picking up the single at the local department store on the edge of town one rainy afternoon just before I had to get myself fitted for a suit for some formal thing I’ve since forgotten.
I’d been a Split Enz fan earlier, of course. I owned their 1982 album Time and Tide (the one with “Dirty Creature”, “Never Ceases to Amaze Me” and “Six Months in a Leaky Boat”, all of which got play in the early days of the channel). So when the younger Finn brother Neil chose to go it alone after their 1984 split, I was curious. Would they be as quirky and catchy, or would they go in a different direction? By 1986, it would seem he’d take the latter route, taking his songwriting much more seriously, his style becoming more Beatles-inspired. [He’d eventually come full circle with 2024’s CH album Gravity Stairs, which has a very Revolver influence to it, especially its album cover.] This track would be a surprise worldwide hit, even here in the States where it made it all the way to the Billboard’s top ten.
I think the other thing that appealed to me was the guitar work on this song. In a decade of squealy solos and beefy barre chords, this was a song with gorgeous semi-acoustic resonance and curious augmentation. The lyrics told of a life in temporary limbo with an uncertain hope that things would eventually get better. The video manages to capture that perfectly, with Neil walking through room after dusty room, with his bandmates doing all sorts of mundane things like ironing, having breakfast, rehearsing their music. The payoff at the end isn’t success, but escape: Neil finally exits the seemingly endless house, puts on his coat, and walks away into the brightness of the landscape, that emotional weight no longer on his shoulders.
I still hear this song now and again, often while at work. I still air-guitar that opening bass riff. It’s a fun song to play on my guitar as well. And the rest of their discography definitely gets its fair share of play here, as A is quite the fan!
It’s been a long twenty-four years since their last album, 2001’s We Love Life, though like The Cure they’ve been busy off and on in the interim, doing various tours and shows when they can. I’d been a passing fan during their 90s heyday, aware of the classic “Common People” single but little else until 1998’s This Is Hardcore, one of my favorites from the HMV Years. They were yet another band I’d finally get into just when they’re on the back end of their cycle.
Anyway, it’s great to see them back in the spotlight, with a lovely lead single that feels like they haven’t missed a beat at all. I’m yet to sit down and fully experience the new album More, but I’m looking forward to it!
I really have no idea how this band passed me by for six years! Perhaps I’d heard one or two songs on KEXP, but somehow I never got around to checking them out until this last weekend, when their first album was reissued. And man, this band is totally in my wheelhouse: sludgy, noisy echoey shoegaze that’s equal parts Lush, MBV, Curve and maybe even a bit of Boston indie in there as well (especially Mistle Thrush and Swirlies). And Lush’s Miki Berenyi even shows up on one of their songs! It all screams this is now a part of your permanent writing soundtrack collection to me.
Yeah, I’m going to have to investigate this band further, because I am hooked.
After multiple weeks of keeping the guitars safe and sound in their carry bags within the office closet, we’ve finally created enough room where I can put out the two electrics again! My Gretsch (which is in dire need of cleaning and retuning, seems like) is now parked right next to my desk where I can pick it up and noodle around on it whenever I feel the need. My Fender P-Bass is nearby in front of one of the other bookcases.
I don’t remember if I’d mentioned it here before, but I’m thinking of getting rid of my two acoustics as they acquired more dust than play during the Spare Oom years. I enjoyed playing them, I just never found enough time for it. I’m thinking of selling them to Tall Toad up in Petaluma (where I bought my Gretsch), though whether for cash or store credit is up in the air. I doubt I’ll buy another guitar, but I could probably use the credit for recording hardware or something like that. We shall see.
Still, it’s great to see them out in the open again, and I’m looking forward to playing them again. After I give them a good cleaning, of course.
The Beach Boys were a band that took me a long time to appreciate. I’d hear “Good Vibrations” and “Kokomo” and a few other big singles on classic rock radio as a kid but at that point I was a full-on Beatles nerd so I didn’t quite get what they were about. It wasn’t until the early 2010s that I finally decided to do a deep dive into their discography and finally figured it all out.
It’s far more than just the nerdy surf and car tunes and the easy laid-back pop. Brian Wilson was one of those rare songwriters that didn’t just write brilliant songs, he understood the math of them, as I like to say. Well-crafted songwriting to me isn’t just about a catchy riff or a singalong chorus; I see it similar to writing a novel. There are several moving pieces that need some kind of focus, and Wilson was a natural at hearing all those pieces in his head. Unfortunately sometimes the musical mathematics in one’s head doesn’t translate to reality and that can be absolutely infuriating (John Lennon often had the same problem), but he came extremely close with shocking frequency.
And there’s definitely a Beatles-Beach Boys connection there, because if it wasn’t for this wonderful piece of music (my favorite of theirs)…
….there wouldn’t be this song that was inspired by it.
(Not to mention Paul’s continuing love for the band a few years later when he did “Back in the USSR” as a Wilson pastiche.)
I can’t decide if this band is trying to be Comsat Angels, early Cocteau Twins, The Chameleons UK, or all of them and more. Not that I’m complaining, because this is fast becoming one of my favorite recent acquisitions!
What I mean to say is that this new album is definitely hitting all the right buttons for me: echoey 80s post-punk retro goodness that sounds like something you’d hear on some college radio station just about coming in on your boombox in your bedroom. Melodic basslines, vocals alternating between slithery and shouty, jangly guitar riffs, and adventurous melodies that resonate perfectly for me. I highly recommend this one.
Considering I’ve spent the last month or so focusing on moving house and day job stuff, I’ve fallen behind on my listening habits! So I’m going to spend a few days just going through some of the new releases and get my head around them.
Such as the new Peter Murphy album, Silver Shade, which came out on 9 May. I have to admit I really love it mainly because it feels like a true return to his classic form. His last couple of albums were good but very ponderous, but this one brings him back to the style he did best back in the late 80s and early 90s. It really does sound like a mix of the best parts of Love Hysteria and Deep, but with the added bonus of some heavy NIN influence.
Definitely an album I’ll be listening to during writing sessions.
Walk In Silence 