Catherine Wheel
Ferment

THE REVIEW

There are many interesting groups from the early 90s indie (or post-wave) scene that were fatefully and unjustly relegated to a niche circuit in their homeland of Great Britain: among them, surely, are the Catherine Wheel.

Born in 1990, thanks to Brian Futter (guitar), Rob Dickinson (vocals and guitar), Dave Howes (bass) and Neil Sims (drums), the Catherine Wheel, whose name is probably due to "Colours Fly and Catherine Wheel" in the famous "New Gold Dreams" by the Simple Minds, were very appreciated by alternative rock enthusiasts in the United States, where they sought refuge, demoralized by the wave of easy and soulless Brit-pop and because they were decisively outdone in popularity by commendable bands like the Verve and the exceptional Radiohead. Curiously, the Ashcroft and Yorke groups started as supporters of the Catherine Wheel, who, by a sort of mocking irony, ended up experiencing the humiliation of seeing this situation completely reversed to their disadvantage.

This 1992 album, "Ferment," is a collage of dark, shoegaze, early new wave influences, dream pop, and psychedelia, and everything good from the previous decade, thanks also to artists like Echo & The Bunnymen and Pixies, considered by many as the main reference models for Catherine Wheel. The result of all this gives rise to an album with a stylistic and instrumental architecture of enviable expertise and genuineness, of enormous pathos, of dark and orgasmic atmospheres, of rich and full-bodied sounds. Futter and his guitar juggle passionate and visionary harmonies, supported by a bursting and uncontainable rhythm section and Dickinson's voice, deep and dreamy.

Tracks like "Flower to Hide," "Tumbledown" and "Salt" are a crescendo of fiery psychedelic cacophony, like the hallucinatory "Texture" and the captivating "She's my Friend" and "Black Metallic". With "I Want to Touch You" and "Tumbledown", Brian Futter's prowess becomes even more pronounced, engaged in arabesques of lysergic and explosive dissonance, like the opening riff of "Indigo Is Blue". Light and gentle is the eponymous track of the album, with delicate whispers and comforting melodies, alternated by sudden violent strumming; the closing track "Balloons" is fabulous, with a sweeping refrain similar to a carefree nursery rhyme.

Listening to "Ferment" gives you the sensation of entering a path surrounded by distorting mirrors; the impression it leaves is that of having heard sounds that take on body and life, a corporeality sometimes ethereal, seductive and barely perceptible, sometimes impetuous and tangibly devastating. This is the debut work of a band, unfairly relegated to a secondary role, worthy of being remembered as one of the happiest chapters of an era that today is experiencing a second youth, whose sophistication of arrangements and extraordinary emotional impact border on perfection.

Genre: indie-rock/noise/shoegaze