The indie songwriter from Liverpool presents his masterpiece.
Personally, I have the impression that Bill Ryder-Jones has something in mind for me. Ten years ago, the Liverpool native from The Coral released the album A BAD WIND BLOWS IN MY HEART, which everyone liked – except me. In 2018, YAWN, a slowcore record in the style of the Red House Painters, followed, it was my album of the year. Five years later he is now releasing IECHYD DA, which means “good health” in Welsh, and the first track “I Know That It’s Like This (Baby)” reminds me of a band that I miss particularly painfully: Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci , the mild psych-folkies from Wales. Sweet melodies, melancholy piano, strange tempo changes, plus background choirs like the Velvet Underground’s “Femme Fatale” and a harmony sequence partially stolen from “Karma Police”.
The album remains winding, strings play on “If Tomorrow Starts Without Me”, which could be a Cure single, and Ryder-Jones brought a children’s choir into the studio for “We Don’t Need Them” and “Nothing To Be Done”. , “This Can’t Go On” soars like Grandaddy, “… And The Sea” is a spoken piece from Liverpool indie god Mick Head, formerly of Pale Fountains and Shack. With “Christinha” he returns once again to Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, who once recorded a song called “Christina,” which shines through gently here. IECHYD DA seems as if Bill Ryder-Jones had scanned a record collection and collaged parts in such a way that a new image emerged, but the originals remained recognizable. The crazy thing: It could have been my collection.