Back in the early nineties, when Kevin Shields and My Bloody Valentine came up with their Loveless album, they practically broke the back of Creation Records, which soon after went bankrupt. Yet, nobody at the time envisioned what kind of influence that album would have decades after its initial release.
Its ripple effects keep washing up on listeners to this day, and the latest proof comes in the form of ‘Come Back Down,’ the new album by Nashville (yes, that Nashville) duo Total Wife. It is too easy to say that Luna Kupper and Ash Richter, who comprise Total Wife, are just ‘simple’ fans of MBV and all things that were good about the original shoegaze for two reasons.
First of all, following in the footsteps of something that is still considered as trailblazing as the ‘Loveless’ album and doing it all in the right way is no easy feat to achieve – many have tried and failed. And secondly, not only have Total Wife succeeded in correctly following MBV’s footsteps, but they were able to give additional touches of their own in the form of electronic embellishments and their placement of the whole concept into a form of a dream sequence.
“This album is made from a single thought unfolding endlessly”, Kupper explains. “I was always trying to remind myself of the initial idea and always fall back on how I felt when I first fell in love with recording”.
Under the influence? Certainly, but both the influence and its take here are quite great, thank you.
