Ob Ryan McGlone (Gesang) und David Ritchie (Gitarre, Bass, Keyboards) ihr neustes Band-Projekt Seeing Other People nun nach einer Filmkomödie von 2004, nach dem 2019er Album der Experimental Poprocker von Foxygen oder nach einem Dating-und-Beziehungspodcast selben Titels benannt haben? Nix Genaues weiß man nicht.
Überliefert ist, dass den beiden Musikern aus dem schottischen Edinburgh, welche Kennern der schottischen Indie-Musikszene in der Vergangenheit bereits mit Bands wie The Youth and Young oder People, Places, Maps durch die Gehörgänge gerauscht sein könnten, inmitten des x-ten Corona-Lockdowns die eigene Zimmerdecke auf den kreativen Kopf zu fallen drohte. Also traf man sich zu gemeinsamen Songwriting-Sessions, wannimmer es die Situation eben zuließ. Recht schnell hatte man elf Songs beisammen, welche unlängst auf dem Album „Theoredics“ veröffentlicht wurden. Die beiden selbst umschreiben ihren Sound selbst augenzwinkernd als „Americana mit dem typisch schottischen Gespür dafür, dass das Schlimmste immer nur kurz bevorsteht“ und ziehen Referenzen hin zu Künstler*innen wie „Sam Fender, Springsteen und Jenny Lewis“. Wer also sein Hörerherz längst an Bands wie Idlewild, Frightened Rabbit und Co., die ihr Herz auf der Zunge und, neben einem Gespür für große Refrains, auch einen breiten schottischen Akzent hinaus in die Welt tragen, verloren hat, der sollte bei diesem Album, welches es zudem via Bandcamp als „name your price“ gibt, dringend ein Ohr riskieren…
„Hailing from Edinburgh, Seeing Other People were, like most bands, born out of circumstance – albeit unforeseen and globally reaching ones. Mid-Lockdown, friends Ryan McGlone (The Youth and Young) and David Ritchie (folda) found themselves forced into ‘back to basics’ song writing – given that they had no possibility of using a studio environment to hone their sound.
This did, however, mean that the songs came thick and fast. They met on park benches, town squares, and then later in well ventilated rooms to write wherever and whenever they could.
What was produced forms the bones of their upcoming debut album ‚Theoretics‘, due for release on 10 December 2021. A labour of love where the songs were, from a very early stage, designed to be part of an album, and listened to with this fully in mind. Not a concept record as such, but one that juxtaposes the hypotheticals and toxic nostalgia of an average thirty something against knocking some sense into yourself with hopeful optimism.
The songs effortlessly float between the two. Album opener ‚Theoretics‘ imagines being a guest at the wedding of someone you once loved, and then slides effortlessly into lead single ‚Revival‘ – which despite its character driven narrative – is just about loving music.
‚Inflections‘ lyrically encapsulates the albums love for, and influence of, the other side of the Atlantic. Before ‚Breathe‘ tells an almost early Taylor Swift style story of a couple throughout their lives.
The sweeping soundscapes continue before gut-wrenching album closer ‚Realist‘. A song as open and honest as anything McGlone has written before, detailing his own mental health struggles but setting these aside the wider context of guilt around his own privileges. Without giving the albums most heartfelt lines away – to paraphrase a movie you just may have seen – they remind us all that time is short and we should either ‚get busy living, or get busy dying‘. Bookending the album with ‚Theoretics‘ as the melancholic fantasy and ‚Realist‘ as the triumphant, yet sobering thought.
Fans of Sam Fender, Springsteen, and Jenny Lewis will notice the musical homages, while the lyrical content offers both intimate and relatable snapshots of a life careening towards middle age – yet simultaneously embracing and fearing this. In a nutshell, this is Americana with that distinctly Scottish sense that things taking a turn for the worst is only ever just around the corner.“
Rock and Roll.
ANEWFRIEND 