Ways Of Seeing

This is the wall at the back of our cupboard under the stairs, one of those cupboards that when you open it everything- the ironing board, the hoover, the stepladders, a pair of shoes- falls out on you. Or at least it was- it's been sorted now. Sorting it revealed the wall which looked to me like an abstract expressionist painting from the 1950s. It's gone now too, painted white. 

This pair of songs are both new, came out recently and although they don't sound much like each other have become linked for me- I've been playing them back to back and they evoke similar feelings in me. Firstly the latest song from Khruangbin, May Ninth, a promise of springtime coming. Someone said recently it's beginning to feel if not like spring then at least like the end of winter. May Ninth makes me feel exactly that. It is just over three minutes long, the sonic equivalent of sunshine, the delicate guitar playing, the notes ringing and rippling like a happy Vini Reilly, the drums just so on it as to be perfect and the bass padding away as the words waft by, 'Waiting for May to come... Just another day'. Something very close to pure feeling in a song, an emotional hit and a few minutes of optimism for the end of February.

I've been pairing it with the latest single from the forthcoming Ride album, an Andy Bell song called Last Frontier, four minutes of soaring, chiming indie rock with an early 90s New Order feel (if this song had been on Republic it would stand alongside Regret as the album's best moment). Over streamlined bass and drums and twin guitars Andy songs of 'Ways of leaving/ ways to say goodbye/ Ways of seeing/ Seeing eye to eye/ Without losing our way'. Like Khruangbin's May Ninth, it's emotive and inspiring, music that makes you feel something.