The Pop Corporation

Even though Ride referred to their 1994 LP ‘Carnival of Light’ as “Carnival of Shite”, and being a departure from their usual jangle of noise and shoegaze, many fans regard it a lesser work.

The Pop Corporation disagrees, and disagrees hard.

You see, back in ’94, Britpop was kicking in and a number of groups started to promote the synthetic side of life and sending Englishness up with a wink and pair of Docs. A number of those albums aged poorly or were pretty average to begin with.

However, it did usher in a second wave of ’60s pop, and amongst the tales of check out girls and Me-isms, there was echoes of The Kinks, Deep Purple, Syd-era Floyd, chunky psychedelics and layered harmonies. It wasn’t all “Oi! Pints!”

One of the most psychedelic albums of the period was Ride’s ‘Carnival of Light’, filled with woozy gems, Hammond organs, 12 strings and a band who left shoegaze to transform themselves into something like an English Buffalo Springfield or something.

The LP underperformed, steamrollered by the runaway trains of Blur, Pulp, Oasis, Suede and Elastica. So unkind were the Britpop heads that they preferred to promote Echobelly and Shed Seven, which is fine and all, but ‘Carnival of Light’ was unfairly buried.

Why unfair? Because ‘Carnival of Light’ is the ‘Odessey and Oracle’ of the ’90s and that’s a hill we’ll die on.

The swooning gorgeousness of ‘From Time To Time’ to the bone-breaking cover of The Creation’s ‘How Does It Feel?’, and the mystic instrumental of ‘Rolling Thunder’, the LP is varied and sounds like a band with a tremendous record collection.

‘Natural Grace’ is a West Coast gem, and ‘Crown of Creation’ is a wonderful slice of Power Pop to complement the heavy prog-lite of ‘Moonlight Medicine’.

Fact is, Ride had the chops to take a massive swing and move away from their Shoegaze days, and get legendary producer John Leckie in to make a fabulous, pastoral rock LP.

Obviously, being the ’90s, there’s a few ham-fisted lyrical shortcomings, but that didn’t stop or hinder any of their peers. And the Stonesy children’s choir on’ I Don’t Know Where It Comes From’ is a tad cringy, but it’s not enough to write a whole album off, especially one as great as this.

Listening to ‘1000 Miles’ now, it’s sounds as shimmery and lovely as it ever did, like some Paisley Underground classic, or the cosmic jangly cousin of REM.

One obvious reason for the album’s savaging is that, in the 1990s, reviewers were very keen on the whole build-’em-up-and-knock-‘ em-down shtick, and given the universal praise of Ride’s previous work, and a chronic inability to allow bands to switch things up, ‘Carnival of Light’ wasn’t given a fair run.

The follow up, ‘Tarantula’ didn’t fair much better (again, unfairly) and Ride disbanded.

These two albums are considered a footnote by many, but really, they took up what fan favourite ‘Twisterella’ started. Ride got more melodic, and swapped one type of psychedelic music for another. The early stuff was great, but for fans of harmony and hooks, they remained great – just in a different manner.

Young bands rediscovered shoegaze and of course, the earlier Ride songs, but now, it’s time to give ‘Carnival of Light’ it’s flowers. It’s a gorgeous, broad, tuneful LP that deserves the love it wasn’t shown on release.

You can get the reissue of it here on dayglo vinyl