Retracing Our Steps (2007-2014) by The Pineapple Thief
Release date: December 12, 2025Label: Kscope
There is the tunnel, the drive, and the hope to see the light at the end of the tunnel to start a new chapter in your life. There is no denying that The Pineapple Thief are one of those bands that you have to check out and have repeatable listens, and it is difficult to put them in what category. Are they alternative? Progressive? Psychedelic? Electronic? Trip-hop? Indie rock? The answer? It’s all of the above. The current continuation of where they left off in their 2023 box set How Did We Find Our Way (1999-2006) is Retracing Our Steps (2007-2014).
This 7-CD/1 Blu-Ray Set consists of The Pineapple Thief albums from What We Have Sown to Magnolia, followed by disc seven of The Acoustic Versions. Now unfortunately at the time of this review, the Atmos mix wasn’t available to delve into. For Bruce Soord, the founder behind the Pineapple Thief, to revisit the next chapter in the box set by doing his own remixes on the albums, must have been a herculean task to tackle.
“Being able to make those songs sound so much better was rewarding”. Soord mentions in the foreword notes, “I had to rebuild a computer exactly as it was in 2006 and gradually rebuild it right up to how I had it when we did Magniolia in 2014. All the software that won’t work on modern computers, re-installed”.
He’ll admit that it wasn’t an easy task, almost like going through an old scrapbook with mixed memories, and retracing his steps with the band he founded. I’ll be the first to admit, I’m not the biggest Pineapple Thief fan, but here on Retracing Our Steps, it’s like a step back in time and into Soord’s parallel universe to see what he was doing between those time periods, jumping from Cyclops Records to the Kscope label.
With so many box sets, or Super Deluxe Edition’s I’ve tackled on Echoes and Dust, ranging from Van der Graaf Generator, Peter Hammill, The Who, Robin Trower, Ozric Tentacles, Be-Bop Deluxe to Bill Nelson’s Red Noise, The Pineapple Thief’s Retracing Our Steps is the ultimate soundtrack for anyone who wants to delve into the band’s discography. From What We Have Sown, Tightly Unwound, The Dawn Raids and Rarities, Someone Here Is Missing and Show a Little Love EP, All The Wars to Magnolia, we get the picture that Soord is almost like a painter, illustrating the songs brought to life in his music.
The 27-minute track ‘What We Have Sown’ is as intense as electronic you can get. You feel the shrieking guitar sections, mellotrons, free-jazz orientation, pounding drum beats, and very much like a cross between Sonic Youth and The Flaming Lips doing Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, The Pineapple Thief go up in space during the calm after the storm.
It goes into some deep, mournful piano chords, eerie synthesisers, and mellotrons floating across the galaxy with its eerie early Floyd-like approach in its Kind of Blue experiment. Bruce is very much like a mad scientist, creating his own take of a graphic novel but a step further beyond the DC and Marvel universe of where the superheroes who were once the darlings and supporters people look up to, have now turned into homicidal maniacs. Think Watchmen meets The Walking Dead. Of course I’m talking about Gail Simone’s incredible story, Leaving Megalopolis.
The spooky turned electronic groove behind ‘Tightly Unwound’ wants to make you think its Halloween all over again and hit the dance floor with its ‘60s electronic textures as if Tim Bowness had added his own production to Soord’s arrangements making sure he stays true to the composition. It does have this Giallo-like approach as if he was scoring this to Mario Bava’s Blood and Black Lace, but with a terrifying setting.
I always imagine that the band are being compared to Radiohead, now I wouldn’t compare it to them because that would be too much of, as I always say, a cop-out. They are who they are by adding in the flow and ebb in their sound. Still, it is very important to make you give an understanding on how The Pineapple Thief can never repeat the same approach, but move forwards and never look back.
When we get to ‘The West Coast’ Soord takes his acoustic guitar, up towards the air, and channel the melodic texture of Gilmour’s intro on ‘Dogs’ from the Animals album that brings to mind. There’s a bit of sadness, a bit of loss of innocence, and the strength to move forward. He pours his heart and soul behind this composition and giving it all he’s got.
Once we get into the alternative rock territory on ‘The State We’re In’ it details the nightmare that is unveiling. Soord details what is to come, what the situation is happening in both the States and in Europe at the same time. It’s this train-chugging riff, Muse-like approach from their golden-era, but with a hope that there will be peace as we head into this mellotronic tunnel, and lukewarm acoustic crisp that’s waiting for us.
The acoustic versions on ‘Last Man Standing’ and ‘Burning Pieces’ fuses the haunting melodies from their electrical outlets as Bruce envisions Steven Wilson’s arrangements from his Insurgentes time frame. And he’s creating this campfire-like scenario like telling scary stories, scaring campers shitless like there’s no tomorrow.
It’s has this very folky, almost gothic horror storyline, straight out of the structures from Alan Moore’s textures that Bruce himself has paid attention to. It quietly goes into some orchestral cello ascending momentum on ‘Burning Pieces’ before landing back on dry land for a brief moment. You could tell he his pouring his heart and soul with Steve Kitch’s keyboard strings adding in the crime scene that’s about to unfold.
‘Too Far Gone’ is The Pineapple Thief going into some heavier altitude. There are the pounding drums, climbing guitars chugging their way to our solar system as the mellotrons fill in Soord’s harmonising vocalisations. Some really, yes, I will say it, the Radiohead momentum throws right into the middle of this bad boy during The Bends-era, but always has that eruptive cannon blast that’s waiting to happen, any moment before it ends.
Once Polly Glass’ incredible liner notes fill in the next chapter of The Pineapple Thief’s story and her interview with Soord, it contains photos of the band performing, promo pictures, polaroids reflecting fun memories, and Peter Clemons’ (Clemo for short, who has a blogsite called Coventry Music Articles, run by Trev Teasdel) details the first time he saw the band perform at a gig in Telford that made him a true fan nearly 20 years ago which I believe it was March 11th, 2006 where the band performed at the time they were promoting and someone might correct me about this, their fourth album 10 Stories Down.
In closing, Retracing Our Steps represents an incredible chapter combining the wonders and mystery behind The Pineapple Thief’s music. Bringing in these sonic alchemy’s, intense rhythm sections, electronic grooves, and pulling you even further to see what you’ve been missing. And we hope that their next box set covers the third chapter of the band’s story from 2016 to 2024.
