Ride
Today Forever

"Today Forever" EP probably represents the pinnacle of Ride's creativity culminating in the final track "Today", one of the most paradigmatically beautiful pieces of the shoegazing era.

"Today" embodies everything a shoegazing track should be: hypnotic, detached, enveloping. But here it truly goes beyond the genre characteristics to offer 6 minutes of masterful music. The crescendo of "Today" is truly remarkable: it starts with guitar notes that already lift you, cradle or hypnotize you, but the most astonishing aspect is how the elements overlap through successive additions until they form a dense and relentless wall of sound. The exact impact of the sound blend becomes clear only in the sudden ending, which, by bringing back silence, highlights the impressive cascade of sounds that preceded it. After all, if shoegazing had a purpose, it was in the systematic study of the space between silence and noise. In no other track is this as evident as in "Today": when the music stops, it feels almost like a revelation, a magical moment. The return to silence brings a sharp closure to the song, like a vision ending, a dream awakening you filled with wonder and desire. The track is supported by a magnificent effect-laden guitar that lingers on a vibration that literally floats in the ether and prevents you from touching ground until the end.

Paradigmatic of shoegazing, "Today" is also so in its lyrics: a reflection of a depressed, suffering, transient generation, inert in its lack of will, suspended between indolence and mysticism: "I want her, I don't want her; I need her, I don’t need her; last thing I remember I don’t know". "Today" is the definitive shoegazing track; it is the consecration of Ride.

The other 3 tracks on the EP, those preceding the conclusion, are beautiful, no doubt about it. "Unfamiliar" brings certain Cure sounds to the shoegazing territory but is supported, like many Ride compositions, by an energetic and vibrant rhythm section. Indeed, what distinguishes Ride from similar bands is perhaps the great energy in many tracks: the melancholic melodies are accompanied by a sort of fervent and repressed anger. Where "Unfamiliar" is dense and rich, "Sennen" seems to soar and be carried away by a light and delicate rhythm. It's a relaxed song, where Ride seems at ease in writing a more carefree melody than usual. "Beneath" returns to the classic Ride sound, but by then we are nearing the grand finale, Ride’s masterpiece, what makes "Today Forever" EP the band’s absolute peak.

One last note on the EP format, a format dear to me, fascinating in its brevity, particularly suitable for this type of music, very intense, demanding, which in a way requires that you part from the listening experience with a sense of incompleteness, emptiness, a lack rather than satiety. Today, forever.