Andy Bell Says Ride's New Album Is "Equal Parts Motörhead and William Basinski"

Photo: Lucia Graca

BY Calum SlingerlandPublished Dec 22, 2016

At the start of December, UK shoegazers Ride announced they were in the studio at work on an upcoming album, which will be their first since 1996. Now, guitarist Andy Bell has revealed more details on the forthcoming effort.

In a magazine clipping posted to the band's Facebook page, Bell revealed that the recording process was initially sparked by a jam session the band had upon announcing their reunion:

We made it out in the country. We recorded it in 17 days, in a studio called The Vale. We went to hang out there when we announced the reunion, in 2014 We hadn't picked up instruments together for 20 years so our way of celebrating the fact that we were going to get back together was to go down to this studio miles from anywhere, plug in and see if it works.

News of a new record was first broken by producer Erol Alkan. Bell told the magazine that Alkan has "endless enthusiasm and patience and the right mentality to get the right stuff out of us," revealing that all members have writing credits on the record:

One of the things on the album came from a recording on an iPhone of a jam we had in Honolulu - though there's not a Hawaiian theme. There's a couple where one person has brought in the entire thing, but there are far more where we've jammed out something and one of us has taken the initiative to do the melody and words, or some other permutation of it all.

But what will the record sound like? Bell continued: "At times, it's quite trash and poppy and other times it's quite ambient psychedelic. It's equal parts Motörhead and William Basinski. Aggressive ambience!"

While Ride's new effort does not yet have a release date, the clipping indicates the record will arrive in the summer of 2017. Find it below. 

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