North Atlantic Oscillation - Grind Show
Release Date: November 16, 2018 on Vineland Music
This, from the
official press release: “... a dramatic shift into more accessible territory:
pop, electronica, rock & even folk elements ...”
I’ve been honoured and able to
call Sam Healy my friend for a couple of years. This wasn’t the intention when
I calmly suggested his first solo project Sand
was the best album I’ve heard in the 21st century. When I finally met this
talented man at a low-key North Atlantic Oscillation gig in Birmingham 3½ years
ago, I soon learned that we had very similar senses of humour; he had an
inventive, playful mind that wasn’t scared to juxtapose an obvious position. Or...
he was quite mad.
I mention this, not because I
want to be seen as a namedropper, or to shoehorn in the fact I still rate the
first Sand album very highly, I mention it because Healy is a bit of a joker
and I’m really not sure why the press release is worded that way... You see, I
am a North Atlantic Oscillation champion and I believe they should have a far
bigger audience than they have. The thing is NAO to me are pop, rock, folk electronica – that’s pretty much how I ‘sell’
them to people (and probably 50% of the reason those people never follow my
advice). So reading a press release that suggests the band are moving into that
direction sat uncomfortably with me, because, on initial listens, Grind Show is quite possibly the least
accessible of their albums, so far.
North Atlantic Oscillation is now
Healy alone. That also bothered me. I was a firm believer that former bassist
Chris Howard grounded him and made him aware of real music. Sam once told me that Chris was the guy who introduced
him to a lot of his later musical influences; introduced him to the classic
rock and prog that I grew up with and hear in NAO’s work. I also believed Ben
Martin’s drumming was one of the reasons they had such a unique sound; often
described as sounding a bit like the Flaming Lips, I’d call that comparison
bullshit, apart from the way Ben smashed his drum kit like there was no
tomorrow. Armed with the knowledge that both had left the band to pursue other
dreams also filled me with an uncertain dread.
Let’s get this out there: I
thought the band would feel a little incomplete without the missing members –
yet their influences are there to be heard, even if they were not there in
recording. I listen to it and I’d argue with Sam until the coos come hame that Grind Show is actually a departure from more ‘accessible
territory’; to me it’s more like a post-modern post-rock album. I still see
those similar and familiar influences, but performed now in a more ‘personal’
way. It still has that ‘epic’ feel the last two albums particularly had, yet in
many ways it feels as stripped back as Grappling
Hooks, but now with the influence of age and experience. This really isn’t
a bad thing because the brilliance of individual musicians (or musician) tends
to be easier to detect.
My initial impression was it’s
more like a follow-up to Sand’s 2nd album A Sleeper Just Awake, probably down to the more electronic feel and
the use of effects to conjure up uncertain atmospherics. However, Healy employs
a lot of different vocal styles, testing his range, experimenting with new
sounds. He really hits his stride with Sequoia, the 9th track, it’s
the first track that truly allows Healy to stretch those brilliant vocals... he
has a brilliant voice – like a mix of Cat Stevens, Peter Gabriel, Mark Hollis,
Art Garfunkle, Scott Walker and Jimmy Krankie – and this is the first time in
the album that he really gets to belt one out. That’s not to say he doesn’t
stretch his pipes sooner, it’s just the track that shows you how powerful his
voice can be.
Apparently, doing breakdowns or
track-by-track reviews is not du rigueur nowadays – which, just to digress for
a moment, seems like a ‘rule’ introduced by people who got criticised for only
reviewing the tracks off of albums they like. However, I feel that
track-by-track reviews are for retrospectives rather than immediate snapshots
of current stuff; and besides how boring is one man’s literary interpretation
of his feelings towards songs he’s not familiar with, but wants to convey an
illusion of knowledge? Yes, I’m aware I can usually make anything shine, but
even I have limitations and to breakdown the entire album into individual items
doesn’t necessarily lean itself to being good promotion and feels a little
anal...
Sam tells me in an interview he
did with me for The Progressive Aspect – music review site @ http://theprogressiveaspect.net/ - that
many of the songs from this album were like, ‘Pulling teeth out of a larger
tooth’ so it kind of makes writing mini reviews for each song almost trite and
disrespectful considering the time a reviewer spends on a track compared to the
relative time an artist can spend producing it for us. That said, the outstanding
tracks on the first listens are maybe no longer the go-to tracks, but most all
have one thing in common, they’re North Atlantic Oscillation songs. I have my
reservations about opening the track with Low Earth Orbit; but in my head the
track that sounds most like a leftover from the last Sand solo project could be
perfectly placed – this was then, this is now!
I’d urge you to listen carefully
to tracks like Weedkiller, Spinning Top, Sirens, Hymn and Fernweh – all showcase what is
best about this band’s ability to create mini-opuses and I don’t mean in a 15
minute prog rock form, but inside 6 minutes (there are only 3 tracks over this
mark and none by much). No band has the ability to create songs textured with
both light and dark without jarring the listener. The Third Day showed us what subtleties were capable of NAO; it was
an album shrouded in modern-prog rock songs you’d be hard pressed to categorise
so pejoratively (which made it so stunningly refreshing), there are elements at
work in this album, but reviewing this album [this review will appear in a much
edited form] for a prog rock oriented site seems almost like an insult; it goes
way beyond facile descriptions. But you have to give it time...
You know the expression, ‘It’s a
grower’? Well, Grind Show is exactly
that. It isn’t accessible; I believe it’s the least immediate album by the
‘band’ so far, but what it lacks in some areas it makes up in others by being
wildly inventive, unexpected and quite beautiful and this becomes crystal clear
as you grow more familiar with songs, leading me to wonder what my initial
reaction to the album was all about. Parts of tracks that I found jarring on
initial listens now make so much more sense; there’s a distinct Miles Davis jazziness
to the album that makes the sometimes in-yer-face electronic bits fit in with
the customary cushioned wall of sound you normally associate the band with.
When you produce music as complex
and intense as this, Talk Talk can never be too far from creative comparisons. NAO
might currently be just Sam, but he has had a lot of production help from Pete
Meighan, the Dublin-based producer who has worked with the band before and was
instrumental (literally) on Healy’s solo efforts. I hope their relationship
more than just resembles the one between
Talk Talk’s Mark Hollis and his producer friend Tim Freise-Greene – because
look what music those two geniuses went on to create?
In conclusion; I’m in an
unenviable position: what if I thought the album really was shit? I have a
preview because I’m a fan [who writes great reviews] and a friend; does that
put pressure on me to be kind? Would I be? Well, I did really think ‘WTF?’ the
first time I heard it, but as stated above, more because it wasn’t what I
expected and because I disagreed with the ‘accessible’ claim. Ask yourself
this; what does a fan truly expect from a new album anyhow? I often wonder if
aficionados and die-hard fans just want their favourite bands to do their favourite tracks – constantly
repackaged or reworked so they don’t have to think about new songs, directions
or ideas. I was the same; I approached this album with more dread than
anticipation because... What if I didn’t like it?
If anything, in my mind NAO have
become more uncategorisable than they were last week. If this album came out
under the Radiohead banner there would be priapic rock DJs poking each others’
eyes out trying to be the most enthused about it; but it’s by a little known
bloke in Edinburgh (originally from Ireland) who already has a back catalogue
with more brilliance and invention than most rock stars can muster in their
entire careers; so it’s probably never going to get the recognition it deserves
(at least, not yet).
Grind Show is sublime. If The
Third Day was velvet, this is felt – smooth but with a rougher edge. It’s
full of atmospherics, feeling, diversity and invention. In many ways it’s
haunting while being uplifting; happy while reflecting on sadness. And, I will
concede it feels more like a rock album, but I don’t quite know why. I hope it’s
going to attract many new fans, but if it doesn’t I feel sorry for all those
people who don’t get what I do.
The test of a great album is how
long it stays on your record player; The
Third Day was played just last week (not even in anticipation of this new
project); I don’t know if Grind Show
will be played in 2022 as much as The
Third Day has been since 2014, but at the moment I really hope so.
9/10
Pre-order
now on CD/MP3/WAV > http://bit.ly/GRINDSHOW and
receive Low Earth Orbit as an immediate download.
Low Earth Orbit video on You Tube - https://youtu.be/gHRiCjB3mB8
