Swell apply for a tour-guide position

The best is music that connect with something in a listener by uploading into one, or more, pleasure files by way of attaching itself to an aural or visual memory, place, a person, situation, environment, mind-game… Swell’s ‘Whenever You’re Ready’ soundtracks a Californian drive, from the Golden Gate Bridge, switching on with a view from the Oakland side: the city is in front, Alkatraz to the left, across Pier 49, Presidio to the right… It is a sunny Californian day.

It is appropriate as one of the members, David Freel, lives there. After spending time observing the civilisation minding its own business, you rejoin it and head down south, all the way to Santa Barbara, where the returning founder, Sean Kirkpatrick, resides. Impression of this sonic trip has been evoked before a realisation that the cover and inner illustrations are Kirkpatrick’s paintings of sights along the famous Highway 101. Scout’s (Niblett) honour!

From the start up with ‘Soon Enough’ it is a drive that goes pass many a vista, taking in mountainous scale as well as composed emo-scenery. ‘Next To Nothing’ is a beautiful psyche-take on Beach Boys’ music for sand-worshippers with ‘War Comes Down’ getting countrified… The relative tranquillity of the first half of the album is balanced with more dynamic tracks later on. ‘World Gifts’ urges to seize the moment, ‘Always Everything’ is as dreamy as a snooze on a sunny beach before picking up its surfing pace to clock in an impressive 6 minutes 40 seconds.

‘California, Arizona’ is an epic cut, analysing distances separating us from those (of the herbal set) we have met on the way, which closes the album with a jolly bang. This is a drifter’s album, a great accompaniment on a highway to hell. It sure helps cheer up the tragic ride we are on… Reality!

‘Whenever You’re Ready’, Swell will be here to greet you with some great Californian ‘hospitality’. All’s swell with the world, surely: Disney, dance, Deadwood…

8/10