With alternative rock seemingly now the mainstream (ironic, huh) and indie music losing its teeth, it is nice to hear the echo of a better musical time running through Raised on Candy’s eponymous debut album. Although I’m not implying that it is nostalgic or a backward glance, it does seem to acknowledge that the 90s were a better time for rock music, a time when words like alternative and underground actually did what it said on the tin!
Across 12 tracks, they wander these alternate sonic byways, creative paths that pass through grunge pastures and over college rock hills through explosive shoegazing textures and abrasive post-punk salvos.
“Midnight Creeper” is a blend of gothic atmosphere and industrial grit, a fine balance of understatement and attack; “Like A Bird” is spacious, shimmering indie, and “The Ponderosa” is all gnashing staccato salvo’s, wandering bass lines and the sort of on/off energy that evokes Pixies sonic force.
A wiser man than I famously noted regarding the Velvet Underground that “while not many people bought their albums, everyone who did started a band. I think this is largely true about the Pixies as well.” I think that the same may come to be true about Raised on Candy; this is the sound of rock music remembering what it is all about and then blurring the lines to create something that feels both reminiscent of better times and a headlong charge into a bright new future for rock music.
So great is Raised on Candy that I didn’t even have to drop the fact that this is also one of the last albums that the legendary Steve Albini recorded, before he headed off to the great gig in the sky.
