This is the point at which I introduce you to my all-time favourite band. Some of their finest stuff isn’t that easily accessible - but this is the song I’d use to introduce a new listener. It’s distinctively different to anything else you’ve heard, yet it’s not weird enough to scare people off.
This is the point at which I introduce you to my all-time favourite band. Some of their finest stuff isn’t that easily accessible - but this is the song I’d use to introduce a new listener. It’s After their début album Throwing Muses, and in a highly-productive era before the follow up House Tornado, the band produced some of their finest work - the Chains Changed EP, the Fat Skier mini-album, and this track - their contribution to the 4AD compilation album Lonely Is an Eyesore.
If you’ve been in the same room as me when my phone has gone off, and I’ve forgotten to put it on silent, you’ve heard the intro to this song - I sampled it for my ring tone. In retrospect, this wasn’t a good idea. If listening to my music on shuffle in the car, when I hear this I have an inevitable moment about confusion over whether it’s just the song or I have a phone call.
An aside
Going back to my opening point about what track you’d play first to someone who doesn’t know your favourite band: I had a conversation with my (then) boss at work when I booked time off to follow a mini-tour of the UK by Throwing Muses. He didn’t know the band, so fired up Spotify, listened to 30 seconds of the “most popular” track and said “It’s a bit 90s, isn’t it?” and hit stop.
I relate this anecdote cos the track recommended by Spotify was Not Too Soon, a massively untypical track by a different singer and writer than the main body of work. I quite like the song, but as any aficionado of any band will tell you, don’t start with the most popular song. A Radiohead nut isn’t going to kick you off with Creep, and a New Order fan won’t start you on Blue Monday.
Oh, and Not Too Soon was released in 1990. So sound 1990s isn’t the insult he was looking for :)
If anyone reading this listens to Fish and likes it, and wants to hear more - just ask me or check out the amazing Chains Changed EP.
