Entertainment For Lively Minds
Time for the Ride reunion?
Posted by Adman on 29 August 2009 - 10:08am.
Now that Andy Bell in seeking gainful employment what do the Massive say to the prospect of a Ride reunion?
I always had a soft spot for the My Bloody Valentine-Lite. The drummer was a friend of a friend and parked his kit in my mate's front room for a time. A couple of them went to the same scruffy college as me in Oxfordshire & I studied with a guy who roadied for them. So, connections... I also reviewed the '92 tour for my uni mag. My first and last foray into music journalism.
So - I genuinely liked them, highly derivative of course, but some good tunes, wispy harmonies, great use of the fx pedals. Any other ex-Thames Valley Shoegazers out there?
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No. Shoegazing was crap.
As Oscar Wilde
once said, I believe...
I treasure
their first EPs and live they were excellent at that time. The shoegazing label is lazy IMO and only tells half the story as by the time of their later albums they were morphing into a fully-fledged rock band....and then Oasis appeared.
"The shoegazing label is lazy..."
I'd agree with that, but that's journalism for you. The tongue was a little bit in the cheek. It became an insult didn't it? Maybe it is time to reclaim shoegazing as a good thing.
Can I be the first to coin the phrase...
"Landfill Shoegazing"?
(rummages in pocket for cloakroom ticket)
mmm OK then
...provided Chapterhouse are the support.
Seriously, Shoegazing was crap.
Musical dead-end. Joyless, uinspiring, no heart, no soul, just distortion pedals and po-faced, self-obsessed guitarists (who couldn't play).
Thanks Jeff...
Don't agree, but I can see that side of it...
But getting back to Ride - Andy Bell is a hell of a guitar player - deffo the best guitarist in Oasis & he stood at the back playing bass. I think Ride caught a moment - they seemed genuinely exciting at the time & spawned hoards of copyists. But for me MBV, Ride & Sonic Youth were the sound of 1988/89. I saw MBV at Manchester Uni in '88 & it was a serious light into the brain moment. Never will forget that feeling. Saw Ride at the Oxford Apollo in '92 (supported by the frankly sub-standard Boo Radleys) and they were bloody awesome - a really tight unit making a thunderous noise. No ego, no rock star posturing, just a pure musical experience.
I thought
Gardener was supposed to be the better guitarist? Mates with Johnny Marr (didnt JM lend him a red 12-string Ricky once when he lost his)?
Boo Radleys = sub-standard?
Nonsense. Saw them at in Glasgow (Tramway?) in Spring 94 (Oasis supporting) and they were terrific. To be fair, they had a cracking LP for their material at the time
Far better than Ride's Glasto outing a few months later
Well I have no problem with Boo Radleys as a rule...
But they were bloody awful that night.
All bands have good nights / bad nights, eh?
Well I think Bell & Gardener are both great players.
Mmmm....
Ride were ok ish........Drive Blind, Chelsea Girl, Polar Bear being the highlights...
I'd be up for it providing Slowdive were the support.
Anyone else up for the Thousand Yard Stare reunion?
Shoegaze Revue Tour
As long as Lush and The Pale Saints are on the bill too.
My point was
that Ride outgrew the label so in reality for them it wasn't a "musical dead end".
As for it being joyless did you actually ever see Ride live? The atmosphere was hardly joyless. Given that Ride were an influence on Oasis in what respect did they not "inspire".
Or were you just generalising?
Yup
I certainly did see them live, twice.
...Oasis were influenced by Ride?
What about Status Quo, the Beatles and Gary Glitter?
Can't imagine Ride would have been on Liam or Noel's
radar?
Prior to joining Creation anyway...
I seem to recall
Noel talking about Ride as an influence in an interview and being part of the reason for joining Creation.
No I don't
they were influenced by Ride. :)
So everyone at the gig was joyless?
They certainly were
...at Glasto 94. To be fair, the new material (Carnival of Light?) was rotten
I saw them in the early days before the first album
in small venues.
In defence of Ride...
... they (and the shoegazing scene) were just the tonic for me in the early 90s. The baggy / Madchester scene got laddish very quickly, and with it quality control slipped. Grunge did nothing for me, and I still think Nirvana et al were spectacularly over-rated. Ride had the tunes, the look and a sonic, fx-laden loveliness that was right up my street. Anyone so clearly in thrall to My Bloody Valentine, The Cocteau Twins and The Byrds got (and still gets) my seal of approval. Plus they were from my home town, although I was living in Birmingham at the time.
So yes, I'd love a reunion assuming Bell and Mark Gardener can bury the hatchet.
Well said!
I am also an Oxfordshire lad who lived in Brum from 89 - 92 so I identify. Musically as well. The Cocteau Twins, now there was a fantastic band!
Although I kind of 'got' Nirvana eventually. Really liked their later period stuff, esp. 'Heart Shaped Box.'
Oy!!
The Cocteau Twins were never Shoegazers.
Never
What he said was:
"Anyone so clearly in thrall to My Bloody Valentine, The Cocteau Twins and The Byrds got (and still gets) my seal of approval."
No-one said they were shoegazers... they were certainly heavily influential.
They we cut from the same cloth
as are Sigur Ros.
Sir
To compare Sigur Ros to the Cocteau Twins is like comparing builders finish magnolia to Da Vinci's Madonna Of The Rocks.
Confusing "older" with "better" there, I feel.
Despite being partial to a bit of flange pedal, I've always been amazed at the overwhelmingly positive press the Cocteaus got. My theory has something to do with an apologetic music press feeling guilty for not featuring enough women on the cover of their weeklies.
By the way, the new album by blokey out of Sigur Ros and his mate is a corker.
Flanger pedal
Pah! All this modern, hi-tech pedal malarkey. Flanging should only ever be done the proper way :-)
Anyone
got a ticket to ride? (sorry it's all the beatles stuff)
Too right Oasis cribbed from the Leave It All Behind hitmakers
Not their best moment, but a clear influence on Eyebrows.
Loved em
and just recently discovered Swervedriver, Curve used to get lumped in with that 'shoegazing' malarky, I dunno how.
They were IT as far as i was concerned aged 17
and then SUEDE came along and that was the end of the love affair. but looking back yeah what a band.
Ride were an astonishing band
Barely into their 20s, their first two albums still sound astonishing. The second album, "Going Blank Again" is fantastic. To dismiss them as shoegazers or indie landfill really doesn't do them justice. The interviews around the time of that second album found them listing Nick Drake and John Martyn as influences, amongst others. Live, they were astonishing. I remember seeing them in Newport, supported by a very early Mercury Rev. They had, probably, the best drummer around at the time. I couldn't believe that just one bloke was making all that noise. Yes, they went off the boil after the second album, but those early eps and two albums surpass anything done by Oasis.
I concur
wholeheartedly, a great live band at that period in their career. I remember reading somewhere that the drummer played the drums as if he was playing the guitar up front.
Me three
I've been listening to Going blank again I estimate every month since it came out. Only Steely Dan and Abbey Road get that much share of my listening time.
I think a reunion is a terrible idea...
... primarily because even their best records now sound really dated. They were indeed a blinding live band, particularly 1990/1991 (Andy Bell and Loz particularly stood out) but were on the decline from the Going Blank Again era onwards. Post-Carnival of Light they were dreadful and Glasto 94(?) was disastrous. Going Blank Again was not much of an album either. The vocals were bad and the lyrics truly awful (whoever thought it was a good idea to print them out and give them away with the LP obviously hadn't read them.) After that Carnival of Light and Tarantula were pretty poor. It's interesting that people mention the Oxford Apollo gig as exceptional, because I was there and thought it was the beginning of the end. Funny how the Boo Radleys (introduced by Melody Maker in the early nineties as 'uglier than Ride' and never backed to the hilt by the press in the same way) went on to produce far superior records that still sound good today. Martin Carr was really a far better songwriter than any of the Ride boys... mentioning John Martyn and Nick Drake is all very well but it means nothing if the records are poor.
P.S. Mercury Rev blew Ride away in early 1992 - certainly at the Brixton gigs anyway.
P.P.S. They were definitely an influence on Oasis. Liam used to have OX4(!) on his answerphone and Noel mentioned how good it was to see 'bands like Ride' in the charts when he did an interview masquerading as one of the Inspiral Carpets in his roadie days (it was printed in Select at the height of Oasis mania around Knebworth.)