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Nov 03, 2023 Web Exclusive By Michael James Hall

Back in ’92 Drop Nineteens were a glowing star in the small constellation of the British shoegaze scene. The catch being that the Boston natives were, of course, not British at all. Adhering to an American tradition of taking the music the English offered and serving it back to them with a new twist of cool, their shining debut album, Delaware, was an essential part of any UK Gen-Xer’s CD pile.

Following up soon after with the magical Your Aquarium EP, the band then fumbled through major lineup changes and a shift in musical direction, delivering a mightily disappointing sequel with National Coma and stumbling to what appeared to be a permanent split in 1995.

Hard Light is their first album in 30 years, stemming from a notion founder member Greg Ackel noted in a recent interview that “this was the first time in my life since stopping making music that I was curious to hear what Drop Nineteens might sound like now.”

Smartly reassembling 4/5ths of the original lineup behind Delaware (latter period drummer Pete Koeplin takes over from Chris Roof here), the answer to Ackell’s question is a positive one—Hard Light is an immensely satisfying return that evokes the slacker tone and overdriven sound of their debut while illuminating the lyrical heart of a band changed by time, often for the better.

You’ll find yourself eerily moved by the title track as Ackell and Paula Kelly harmonize and interweave their voices, his a crisp whisper, hers a honey-drip high, repeating “Time is of the essence” under a percussive spoken word poem: “You are the city, the rain, the weather, the lights, the sound, the reason.” Ackell and Motohiro Yasue’s guitars, rising, melding, and fizzing like overflowing cans of cola, will bring you to an exquisite high.

On the shimmering “A Hitch” you’ll find yourself transported to scenes simply and beautifully conjured in lines such as “Shovel up the snow like I couldn’t live without it” and “in the moonshine, and the riptides and in the meantime on the B-side.” Kelley’s reverse looped backing vocals bounce between speakers and that familiar squalling ocean of guitar lifts, ebbs, then explodes.

There’s a lot of winter here, a lot of farewells too. On the sweetly simple “Lookout” where there’s “Two more hours to go/In the snow” and a chorus claim that “When the trees get weird / I just wanna be here.” “When you’re carrying flowers / Because I’ll be gone / I want to thank you my dears” are the kind of lines that prick the heart and infiltrate the mind; it’s a funeral song and a goodbye kiss that lingers.

Departure also casts a shadow over “Policeman Getting Lost,” an acoustic diamond where you’re “Haunted by the figures of your friends” but “If you get too tired you can lay your head across my pillow / Darkness coming quick this time of year.”

There’s a bittersweet memory behind each of these songs, it seems, and “Tarantula” (hey, is that title a Ride reference?) a firecracker that would have been an indie hit in the early ’90s and deserves to be one now, is perhaps the best of them. “I feel like it’s after school / In the afternoon / In the afterlife.” These are lines that bathe in the amber light of nostalgia, suggesting hazy images that almost let you taste the summer in which the song dances.

Also painting an alluring picture is recent single and album standout “Scapa Flow” boasting a rolling bassline from Steve Zimmerman, silvery fuzz filling in the background while we learn that “Cold dew from the mountain flows down from you / Not for the first time / Turned tears into oceans / So blue and clear.” It’s poetical shit, ya know?

Yasue’s swerving, swirling guitars suggest something from a Hal Hartley soundtrack (that’s damn high praise in case you were wondering) on “Gal” where you’ll find there’s “Some kind of Siamese connection / Two types of total perfection / Outlines that don’t need correction.” Now, sure, those lines could be about a loved one but they could equally be about the voices of Ackell and Kelley, which resolutely should not be separated again.

It goes on; “Another One Another” brings to mind Delaware’s “Kick the Tragedy” in an opening instant; “Rose With Smoke” is a brief instrumental interlude, sneaking into and sloping out of the album gracefully; and there’s epic closer “T,” which paints an intimate scene where we “Stay inside / Close the curtains…some friends come by / And you’re starting to look / To the morning light.”

Truthfully? It’s a Christmas morning of an album, each track a new gift to treasure. It’s a set of songs that bring you deep into them, a mist of musical vapor in which snapshot reminiscences can be made out as the fog wavers.

Maybe it’s because it harks back to what feels like a simpler time. Maybe it’s because we all get old and we need musical anchors like this to hold on to. Maybe it’s because, just like they said on their old gem “My Aquarium”—“I think it’s better the second time around / And at the end / You can do it again.” Whatever the reason for this album hitting so strong, it’s undoubtedly a special record and one you’ll almost certainly adore (ya know, if you like this kinda thing). They sure “do it again” on Hard Light, and they do it almost perfectly. (www.dropnineteens.com)

Author rating: 8.5/10