1991 might already be acquainted to die laborious followers, however on February 7, 2025, it will likely be formally out there for buy on CD and vinyl. Shortly earlier than the discharge, frontman Greg Ackell spoke with AllMusic from a recording studio, the place the band was engaged on a brand new album. He discusses 1991, the band’s return, and ideas on the music scene in the present day.
Let’s bounce proper into 1991. What was the method like unearthing this time capsule of an album?
“Effectively…I am beginning to simply take into account it an album, only recently. It was not an album ever. These have been a set of songs that have been demos on the time. We recorded them on rented reel-to-reel eight tracks, and we recorded them largely in our dorm rooms.”
“Once we recorded the primary demo, we did not know precisely what we have been going to do with it. I wasn’t actually attempting to get us exhibits as a result of I did not even know the way to ship it to a membership. I used to be actually younger, 18, 19 years outdated, and I did not have an actual sense of the Boston golf equipment or the dwell scene. However what I did have have been information, and on the again of these information have been report firm names. They have been largely in England: Creation Information, 4AD, Manufacturing unit Information. I simply put these cassettes within the mail and despatched them over to London. I did not actually count on a lot again, however inside per week or so, we have been getting calls from these labels. And subsequently what occurred was that any individual—her title was Colleen Maloney at 4AD—she despatched a type of cassettes to Melody Maker and NME. They have been the equal of, I suppose, Pitchfork or Rolling Stone now. Folks lived and died by them.”
“A pair weeks after, I acquired a name from our lawyer and he stated, ‘You are a single of the week in Melody Maker,’ and I did not know what the fuck he was speaking about as a result of we did not have a single. We did not have a report deal. We did not have an album. We had nothing. However Colleen Maloney had despatched that to the press, and the press acquired a maintain of it and actually thought loads of it. They needed to make up a label title, as a result of they weren’t presupposed to overview demos. I feel it stated Pentatonic Information or one thing.”
“Whereas we have been determining who to signal to, we determined to go forward and make one other demo. The primary track on that demo was ‘Daymom,’ and after we lastly signed our report deal, a couple of 12 months had passed by. While you’re that age, you are—we have been anyway—transferring ahead and continuously evolving every single day. So after we had this report deal, we have been presupposed to report our first album. I went to the band and stated, ‘Let’s simply write a brand new album. Let’s depart these things behind us.’ It wasn’t that the fabric wasn’t good, it is simply that we have been already in a unique place. So that is what grew to become Delaware, our first album, and these demos simply remained frozen in time. We left them behind in subsequent years.”
“There have been cassettes on the time that went out. I keep in mind we even gave them out to children at exhibits. Over time, as soon as YouTube was invented, somebody determined to add them. It acquired some consideration. We acquired so many requests, and there was a lot curiosity in it that we simply determined to revisit them—to remix them barely.”
“It is very laborious to inform that we remixed something. There’s not loads to remix if you’re speaking about eight tracks. However we labored with good friend of the band’s referred to as Max Rose, man from Seattle that was with us within the early ’90s. Once we got here again, lots of people got here out from the woodwork. Folks have been taken with serving to us out in the best way they might. Max labored laborious on these to get the constancy to a stage that the band was extra snug with releasing, and our label, Wharf Cat, was very from the very starting to launch these things. However as soon as I began accepting that we have been going to do it, it was higher. Being from to date up to now, it did not appear to be a precedence to me. However we’ve got a fan base, and folks need what they need, so we’re glad to be lastly placing it on the market in some form of type that we’re snug with.”
“We referred to as it 1991 as a result of, nicely, the songs have been written and recorded in 1991. I additionally very very similar to that ’19’ and ’91’ are the mirror picture of each other. Clearly, this band has a factor for numbers; we referred to as ourselves Drop Nineteens. So I like that form of symmetry.”
That is wonderful. Had you been serious about revisiting the album earlier than?
“It took place when the band resurfaced…trying on the band’s historical past and what there was curiosity in. However for all these years, no, there was no curiosity. I imply, I used to be conscious of issues on YouTube. Folks would say to me, ‘Oh, I discovered this on YouTube, Greg, is that this yours?’ and I might be like, ‘Yeah,’ however I by no means preferred listening to it a lot in that setting. The audio is fairly terrible. Once more, they have been posting that from cassettes. That was the one approach. Nobody ever had ADATs or something.”
Do you keep in mind any of your artistic inspirations for 1991? Which of these nonetheless maintain true in the present day, and what has been inspiring you recently that did not earlier than?
“In these days, I feel there have been two albums—two bands particularly that I keep in mind. One in all them was My Bloody Valentine Is not Something. Maybe that is apparent. When you take heed to our music, it is definitely spinoff of it. The second was Spacemen 3‘s The Excellent Prescription. These two albums simply appeared very cool to me. I used to be additionally a fan of Sonic Youth‘s Daydream Nation; that is form of a detailed third. I used to be additionally a giant Cocteau Twins fan rising up.”
“I used to be speaking to Neil [Halstead] from Slowdive. I keep in mind after we met 30 years in the past, in London, we had each been conscious of one another’s bands. When he learn the overview in Melody Maker, he thought that it appeared like his band. And the identical goes for us.”
“What we realized was that we weren’t copying one another a lot as we have been each impressed by the identical sorts of music—the identical information, and rising up roughly the identical age. We simply have been on completely different sides of the Atlantic. It was form of humorous revisiting that with him. Slowdive, to their credit score, largely caught by their sound, whereas my band form of advanced into different issues. You do not at all times know what you are going to get with Drop Nineteens. That is simply our nature. So, the 1991 materials does replicate our shoegaziest interval. It was definitely new to us, determining the way to sound like that. It was an thrilling time to be discovering the way to make these sorts of sounds.”
“However in Delaware, we moved barely away from that. It is somewhat bit much less blown out, rather less ethereal. It nonetheless has what we name ‘the feels,’ however it was form of a step away from shoegaze, despite the fact that we hear on a regular basis that Delaware is a shoegaze album. I at all times depart it to different folks to explain what style we’re. I am proudly shoegaze, however I am not expressly a fan of it. There’s a complete fashionable shoegaze scene, notably in America, that I am nonetheless studying about after over a 12 months of being again.”
“All types of issues transfer me now. I like the band Deerhunter. I feel they’re actually sensible. There is a band referred to as Spoon that I feel is possibly the most effective band on the planet; I’ve studied every thing they do. I am a giant fan of LCD Soundsystem and Automotive Seat Headrest. These are the bands that I take heed to loads. I am nonetheless a fan of My Bloody Valentine. I am excited they’re coming again.”
Each My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive, like Drop Nineteens, are bands from the ’90s that had resurrections some two or three a long time later. There’s additionally been an enormous resurgence within the fanbases of those ’90s bands as a result of TikTok. What are your opinions on these sorts of rebirths in music? How do you view your band’s function within the scene?
“Effectively, it is solely been a service to us. Once we determined to come back again, I wasn’t even fairly conscious of this fan base. I am form of tuned out. I did not have Spotify on the time; I do now. I am not on social media. Nevertheless it was fortuitous, and it was a welcome factor as soon as we have been again as a result of it implies that there’s an viewers. However we’d have come again and recorded Exhausting Gentle whether or not there was an viewers or not. The resurgence wasn’t the rationale for doing it, however after all it makes a distinction.”
“I wasn’t conscious of some issues. I did not know if we’d be capable of report and determine issues out and play dwell. I did not know if folks would present up. The final time I performed on stage was within the early nineties. I’d look out on the viewers, and so they have been all folks my age. I referred to as them children again then, ‘trigger I used to be a child, , 18 to 22, 23. However the unusual factor now’s that we play dwell, and I am taking a look at that very same age group. It is uncanny, actually. There are folks from that period within the viewers, however I see them extra on YouTube movies of the band, some bald heads within the again. I do know that these are the folks which might be extra our period. Everybody in Drop Nineteens nonetheless has their hair, however we’re accepting of the truth that we’re all getting older. However the children within the entrance are the sunshine.”
“I do not know what makes one thing go away, and I do not know what makes it come again. I’ve observed that the guitar sound in shoegaze has grow to be form of ubiquitous. It is in nearly every thing; it is in pop music, it is in hip-hop—I imply, take heed to Earl Sweatshirt. I name it “woozy guitars.” I keep in mind Kevin Shields [of My Bloody Valentine] saying to me that since you’re detuning a chord, the ear and the mind is striving to listen to the chord that you just’re not delivering. So by definition, it is form of a romantic instrument since you’re promising one thing and never delivering it. I imply romantic within the literary sense: one thing misplaced, one thing not fairly achieved, one thing unrelinquished. There’s one thing about that sound that could be very seductive. And I feel that persons are lastly catching on to that, which is cool.”
1991, again when it was nonetheless referred to as Mayfield, was a broadly traded bootleg amongst loads of your followers. Figuring out that many listeners might have already heard a number of the tracks or are acquainted with them, what are you most hoping that listeners will take away from this album?
“Effectively, I hope that it satisfies them. It wasn’t straightforward for us to place this factor out. Once we first began to revisit it, we printed up some vinyl ourselves and bought them on the exhibits we have been enjoying. We acquired loads of backlash for that. Folks have been saying, ‘You possibly can’t simply launch it and solely promote it at your exhibits. What if I can not get to the present?’ However the issue is that there is a cash element right here. Printing up 5,000 albums and distributing them isn’t one thing that I can simply whip out my pockets and pay for. It was by no means this band’s place to maintain this music from folks, however you would be stunned on the form of anger that will get on the market. So the one factor I hope 1991 does is simply make folks pleased. We admire the love, however we’re doing our greatest, and never every thing is kind of really easy. We get requests to play in each metropolis, and we are able to solely play the place we are able to play.
Perhaps it is as a result of I am somewhat bit new to social media. I am delicate to studying something unhealthy, ever, which is why I do not even have passwords to our socials. Steve, invariably, my accomplice on this, will find yourself sending me stuff, and I get upset. The overwhelming majority of every thing has been very constructive about us, however I do know that there was positively a factor about 1991 the place folks have been upset once they thought that they weren’t going to have the ability to get it. Effectively, now they will.”
“As for the music itself, I take pleasure in listening to it now too. It sounds higher than it ever did. I keep in mind once I acquired the primary copy of it, I put it on the turntable, and I used to be like, ‘Fuck, this sounds nice.’ I do not know why that is a shock to me, however at any time when I get a product in my hand…typically I am disenchanted. I used to be not with this. I believed it sounded actually good. So I hope folks take pleasure in it.”
After the band broke up, you have been very satisfied that you’d by no means make music once more. And after the discharge of White Gown and Nest, you stated that it could be the very last thing the band would ever launch. Each of those statements turned out to be unfaithful, and now you are making a brand new album. What else do you take into consideration for the longer term? Are you again for good?
“We’re again for now. And…ultimately of this ebook that Tom Faix wrote about us, there have been two strains in there that form of simply summed up my emotions on the time. The primary one was considered one of Lana [Del Rey]‘s: ‘It was such a scene, and I felt seen.’ The second line was mine on the track ‘Nest,’ and it goes, ‘And for the love of God, terrible, I am so glad that I seemed again.’ There’s at all times the likelihood in something that that’ll be the very last thing you do. So I do not know if the band is again for good, however it’s again for now. Paula [Kelley] simply moved again East, which is form of thrilling to us as a result of she was in L.A. all these years. We’re trying ahead to writing and recording this subsequent album. We’re in all probability going to play a number of festivals this 12 months.”
Do you assume there’s extra stability in making music now that you just’re older? Or much less so due to the suggestions from social media coming in from each route? Is there nonetheless some stress?
“There’s at all times stress, however it is not from exterior. The stress is from inside. Writing music is not enjoyable for me, or recording it or something. Now and again I’ve an okay time on stage, a second the place I am like, ‘Oh, that is form of cool,’ and I can take pleasure in it, however it’s not notably enjoyable. What it’s is rewarding. I do not imply that in a financial sense, as a result of it is truly removed from that. However I do it as a result of it is a fulfilling factor to do with one’s life—to go and create one thing, to attempt to make one thing stunning. It is a luxurious, frankly, at the moment. That was true once I began, and it is true now. It is at all times a wrestle, however it’s price it.”
“Now that we’re again, it is grow to be a part of me once more. And I hope I am talking for the remainder of the band right here, too; there is a little bit of tumult that occurs if you depart one thing behind. Change isn’t straightforward. In order tough as it’s, it is a part of me that I am not fairly able to abandon but. I do know that after we do put this down, it’s going to be for good. I’ve had protestations earlier than, however we’re not going to attend one other 20 years to come back again. That is the second run, and after we’re performed, that will probably be it.”
I learn in a previous interview that coming again to the band and to music after so lengthy has felt virtually dreamlike. Do you are feeling such as you’ve woken up but?
“I really feel sleepy is what I really feel [laughs]. Yeah. Nonetheless a bit within the stupor. It is like a previous life, or like waking up and remembering a dream. And the unusual factor now’s that once I get up from goals, I typically nonetheless must remind myself that I am doing this. Like, ‘Oh, we have got a present tonight. I’ve acquired to get to the studio.’ I nonetheless get up within the state of all these years the place this was not a part of my life, so I’ve to remind myself that it isn’t a dream, that I’ve truly acquired someplace to be. I’ve acquired a monitor to put down. I’ve acquired a sound verify at 3 PM. All these items are my life now. Now, I am beginning to dream about my life earlier than I got here again.”
To buy 1991, go to Wharf Cat information.
