Music News - Radioglo release 'In Between Time'
01 May 2015 - 0 Comments
Radioglo are a four piece rock band based in Auckland, whose diverse songs are reminiscent of class acts such as Kings of Leon and The Raconteurs, along with Elbow and Tom Petty. With the release of their debut album, listeners will be able to discover the depth and breadth of the material, which contains an inert catchiness that lingers on. The odd country lick gives a quirky energetic quality to Gene Bennett (Rubicon) and Heath Watson’s (Sour) shared melodic, textured vocal harmonies, and the acoustic guitar focused sound makes it warm and organic. This is further complimented with the laid back 70’s inspired rhythm section of Shannon Slade (Malakai) and Robert Maskell (Channelling Venus, the NZ'ers).
Gene and Heath initially met over the phone when Heath needed a replacement pick up for his telecaster, and when they finally met in person they soon started jamming and decided to work as an acoustic side project, a vehicle for them to play their own songs which weren’t suited to the rock/pop bands they were in at the time. Their first EP, 1 Take Wonders was literally that, as they only had five hours in which to record a 10 track EP, design and print out CD covers, and burn CDs for family Christmas presents. They had been practicing a few songs, including Comet and Failsafe, but on some of them they just showed each other a couple of times in then just hit record. The next EP, Batter Up, also had bass and percussion but they again didn’t hang around and completed this in just three days.
They recorded an album, Imperfectionisim, which sadly never saw the light of day, with Jonny Corker (Rubicon, Gareth Thomas, The Gramophone Band) providing the drums while Gene and Heath covered everything else. The sound was based around the acoustic guitars, but the addition of more present electric guitars and keyboards (on later recordings) served the songs better. Kiwi FM put the song Complain, recorded under the former band name Udro, on the playlist for four months and the band received good feedback from program director Andrew Fagan. However, they discovered that the name was hard for people to pronounce and remember, so they needed to come up with something different. One day the word Radioglo popped into Gene's head, and after a quick online search he found that the only thing that had ever used that name was an obscure 1930's art deco valve radio, which is featured on the cover of the album. It was also at this point they realized that they needed a full band to really represent what they were doing.
Like many bands there have been line-up changes, and Rob is the latest recruit, only joining in 2014 while Shannon, Gene and Heath have been playing together for many years (although Shannon has actually only recently re-joined after a brief hiatus). Matt Short (Sola Rosa, The Feelers, Vietnam War) plays most of the bass on the album, Daryn Harkness (New Telepathics, Harkness Tofu, Dead Flowers, From Scratch…) provided synths whilst concert pianist Justin Bird played on four songs, and old bandmates Jonny Corker and Neil Kulkarni also helped out on bass.
Although there is a distinct Radioglo sound, Gene says “there are no rules to what we bring to the band, which shows in the variation of songs which range from quirky upbeat to solemn downbeat”. When questioned about the album title, he said, “It was a bit of an in-joke of the time it took to finish recording the album, (although it was a lot less than Steely Dan!). But, it also doubles as a philosophical question of what exists between matter and the frequency of waves, time being a measurement of an object and/or event. Music is like a measurement of all those things vibrating.” In-joke or not, the debut is finally available, and music lovers owe it to their ears to grab this with both hands.
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