Emerald Down helps resurrect shoegaze sound

ROSS RAIHALA

Originally published Friday, February 1, 2002

When Olympia last saw Rebecca Basye a few years back, she was just getting the kinks out of her then-new band the Emerald Down.

The group played the usual downtown Oly venues -- the Capitol Theater, Midnight Sun -- but ended up ultimately leaving town for Columbus, Ohio, where the Emerald Down set up shop and got to work on what would become its first full-length CD, "Scream the Sound."

Released in the fall on POPsound, "Scream the Sound" has been a personal headphones fixture as of late thanks -- in part -- to its innovative take on a genre that's not heard much in these parts, the so-called shoegaze sound.

The term "shoegaze" first popped up in the early '90s as a somewhat derogatory way to describe that era's wave of mostly British groups that followed in the wake of My Bloody Valentine and the Cocteau Twins.

Journalists dubbed acts such as Ride and Chapterhouse "shoegazers" as band members tended to stand fairly motionless when playing live, while mostly staring at, well, their shoes.

I think the best example I can give is when I caught Slowdive live in Minneapolis some 10 years ago. The show consisted mainly of three or four people playing guitar or bass, standing in a line in front of the stage and playing as loud as humanly possible. It was amazing.

The idea was to create a sort of dreamlike atmosphere with droning riffs, feedback and barely decipherable lyrics. It was like Phil Spector's "Wall of Sound" updated for a new, blissed-out generation of post-pop kids.

Few of that initial wave of shoegaze bands made any serious commercial impact, particularly in this country -- although Lush did end up playing Lollapalooza, and the Boo Radleys briefly flirted with serious stardom in England.

As a result, most of the groups splintered in the latter half of the '90s, with the major players forming new bands (Mojave 3, Sing Sing and Animalhouse among them).

Ride's Andy Bell even ended up joining Oasis, and his first songwriting contributions to that band are expected on Oasis' next album, planned for release later this spring.

My Bloody Valentine, meanwhile, ended up becoming the Guns 'N Roses of shoegaze, with 11 years and counting since its last album, the much-acclaimed "Loveless."

The weirdest thing to come from all of this, however, has been the underground swell of American bands, such as the Emerald Down, resurrecting the shoegaze sound.

Iceland's Sigur Ros brought it back to worldwide hipster attention after touring with Radiohead and releasing its buzzed-about third album "Agaetis Byrjun" to American ears last year.

Prior to the Emerald Down, Basye was best known in these parts as the guitar player for the Mukilteo Fairies, a punk group that released music on Kill Rock Stars, Outpunk and Yoyo Recordings.

Basye's former bandmates include John Quittner, who is now one of the Tight Bro's from Way Back When, and Jason Reesce, who went on to form ... And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead (a Texas-based group that has a new album due on Interscope that promises to be one of the most unusual major-label records of 2002).

Listening to "Scream the Sound," it's pretty easy to pick out the influences -- Slowdive is probably near the top of the list. But thanks to Basye's honey-dripping vocals and textured guitar work, the band easily manages to become more than the sum of its influences.

"Scream the Sound" is available through K Records' Web site, www.kpunk.com, and it's a steal at $10.

New via KRS

Meanwhile, Kill Rock Stars' Web site, www.killrockstars. com, is offering a few new distributed CDs also worth looking into:

- Former K Records star Sarah Dougher has released her latest solo album "The Bluff" on North Carolina's Mr. Lady Records. It includes guests John Nikki (Primadonnas) on guitar and Sleater-Kinney's Janet Weiss on drums. Corin Tucker, also of Sleater-Kinney, contributes some backup vocals up as well.

- The second "Home Alive" compilation is now out, which benefits the Seattle-based anti-violence project of the same name. The disc, titled "Flying Side Kick," includes a number of regional acts, including the Gossip, the Need, the Makers, Tracy + the Plastics and Carissa's Wierd alongside Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls backed by the Butchies.

Ross Raihala covers music for The Olympian. Send news and Top 10 lists to OlyRoss@aol.com.

The Olympian Copyright 2002

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