1991 might already be acquainted to die onerous followers, however on February 7, 2025, will probably be formally accessible 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 immediately.
Let’s soar proper into 1991. What was the method like unearthing this time capsule of an album?
“Nicely…I am beginning to simply think about it an album, only in the near past. It was not an album ever. These have been a group 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 reveals as a result of I did not even know the right way to ship it to a membership. I used to be actually younger, 18, 19 years previous, and I did not have an actual sense of the Boston golf equipment or the stay scene. However what I did have have been information, and on the again of these information have been file firm names. They have been largely in England: Creation Data, 4AD, Manufacturing facility Data. I simply put these cassettes within the mail and despatched them over to London. I did not actually anticipate a lot again, however inside every week or so, we have been getting calls from these labels. And subsequently what occurred was that someone—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 obtained a name from our lawyer and he mentioned, ‘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 file deal. We did not have an album. We had nothing. However Colleen Maloney had despatched that to the press, and the press obtained a maintain of it and actually thought lots of it. They needed to make up a label title, as a result of they weren’t alleged to assessment demos. I believe it mentioned Pentatonic Data or one thing.”
“Whereas we have been determining who to signal to, we determined to go forward and make one other demo. The primary tune on that demo was ‘Daymom,’ and after we lastly signed our file deal, a couple of yr had passed by. Whenever you’re that age, you are—we have been anyway—transferring ahead and always evolving each day. So after we had this file deal, we have been alleged to file our first album. I went to the band and mentioned, ‘Let’s simply write a brand new album. Let’s depart these items behind us.’ It wasn’t that the fabric wasn’t good, it is simply that we have been already in a special 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 bear in mind we even gave them out to youngsters at reveals. Over time, as soon as YouTube was invented, somebody determined to add them. It obtained some consideration. We obtained so many requests, and there was a lot curiosity in it that we simply determined to revisit them—to remix them barely.”
“It’s totally onerous to inform that we remixed something. There’s not lots to remix if you’re speaking about eight tracks. However we labored with pal of the band’s known 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 inquisitive about serving to us out in the way in which they may. Max labored onerous 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 items. However as soon as I began accepting that we have been going to do it, it was higher. Being from to this point previously, it did not look like a precedence to me. However we now have a fan base, and folks need what they need, so we’re glad to be lastly placing it on the market in some sort of kind that we’re snug with.”
“We known as it 1991 as a result of, properly, 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 known as ourselves Drop Nineteens. So I like that sort of symmetry.”
That is superb. Had you been interested by revisiting the album earlier than?
“It happened when the band resurfaced…wanting 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 would be like, ‘Yeah,’ however I by no means favored 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 bear in mind any of your inventive inspirations for 1991? Which of these nonetheless maintain true immediately, and what has been inspiring you latterly that did not earlier than?
“In these days, I believe there have been two albums—two bands particularly that I bear in mind. One among them was My Bloody Valentine Is not Something. Maybe that is apparent. In case you take heed to our music, it is actually by-product of it. The second was Spacemen 3‘s The Good 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 sort of an in depth third. I used to be additionally an enormous Cocteau Twins fan rising up.”
“I used to be speaking to Neil [Halstead] from Slowdive. I bear 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 assessment in Melody Maker, he thought that it gave the impression of 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 sort of humorous revisiting that with him. Slowdive, to their credit score, largely caught by their sound, whereas my band sort of advanced into different issues. You do not all the time know what you are going to get with Drop Nineteens. That is simply our nature. So, the 1991 materials does mirror our shoegaziest interval. It was actually new to us, determining the right way to sound like that. It was an thrilling time to be discovering the right way to make these sorts of sounds.”
“However in Delaware, we moved barely away from that. It is a little bit bit much less blown out, rather less ethereal. It nonetheless has what we name ‘the feels,’ however it was sort of a step away from shoegaze, though we hear on a regular basis that Delaware is a shoegaze album. I all the time 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 an entire fashionable shoegaze scene, significantly in America, that I am nonetheless studying about after over a yr of being again.”
“Every kind of issues transfer me now. I like the band Deerhunter. I believe they’re actually sensible. There is a band known as Spoon that I believe is perhaps the most effective band on the planet; I’ve studied every part they do. I am an enormous fan of LCD Soundsystem and Automotive Seat Headrest. These are the bands that I take heed to lots. 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 many years later. There’s additionally been an enormous resurgence within the fanbases of those ’90s bands on account of TikTok. What are your opinions on these sorts of rebirths in music? How do you view your band’s function within the scene?
“Nicely, 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 signifies that there’s an viewers. However we might have come again and recorded Arduous Mild whether or not there was an viewers or not. The resurgence wasn’t the explanation for doing it, however after all it makes a distinction.”
“I wasn’t conscious of some issues. I did not know if we might be capable of file and determine issues out and play stay. 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, they usually have been all folks my age. I known as them youngsters again then, ‘trigger I used to be a child, , 18 to 22, 23. However the unusual factor now’s that we play stay, 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 can 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 youngsters 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 seen that the guitar sound in shoegaze has change into sort of ubiquitous. It is in nearly every part; it is in pop music, it is in hip-hop—I imply, take heed to Earl Sweatshirt. I name it “woozy guitars.” I bear 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 sort of a romantic device 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 may be very seductive. And I believe that persons are lastly catching on to that, which is cool.”
1991, again when it was nonetheless often known as Mayfield, was a broadly traded bootleg amongst lots of your followers. Figuring out that many listeners might have already heard a number of the tracks or are accustomed to them, what are you most hoping that listeners will take away from this album?
“Nicely, I hope that it satisfies them. It wasn’t simple for us to place this factor out. Once we first began to revisit it, we printed up some vinyl ourselves and offered them on the reveals we have been enjoying. We obtained lots of backlash for that. Folks have been saying, ‘You may’t simply launch it and solely promote it at your reveals. What if I am unable to get to the present?’ However the issue is that there is a cash element right here. Printing up 5,000 albums and distributing them just 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 shocked on the sort 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 part is sort of really easy. We get requests to play in each metropolis, and we will solely play the place we will play.
Perhaps it is as a result of I am a little bit bit new to social media. I am delicate to studying something dangerous, ever, which is why I do not even have passwords to our socials. Steve, invariably, my companion on this, will find yourself sending me stuff, and I get upset. The overwhelming majority of every part has been very optimistic about us, however I do know that there was undoubtedly a factor about 1991 the place folks have been upset after they thought that they weren’t going to have the ability to get it. Nicely, now they will.”
“As for the music itself, I get pleasure from listening to it now too. It sounds higher than it ever did. I bear in mind once I obtained 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 each time I get a product in my hand…typically I am dissatisfied. I used to be not with this. I believed it sounded actually good. So I hope folks get pleasure from 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 Costume and Nest, you mentioned that it is perhaps 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 account 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 sort of simply summed up my emotions on the time. The primary one was certainly one of Lana [Del Rey]‘s: ‘It was such a scene, and I felt seen.’ The second line was mine on the tune ‘Nest,’ and it goes, ‘And for the love of God, terrible, I am so glad that I appeared again.’ There’s all the time the chance 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 sort of thrilling to us as a result of she was in L.A. all these years. We’re wanting ahead to writing and recording this subsequent album. We’re in all probability going to play just a few festivals this yr.”
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 path? Is there nonetheless some stress?
“There’s all the time stress, however it is not from outdoors. 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 sort of cool,’ and I can get pleasure from it, however it’s not significantly enjoyable. What it’s is rewarding. I do not imply that in a financial sense, as a result of it is really 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 lovely. It is a luxurious, frankly, this present day. That was true once I began, and it is true now. It is all the time a battle, however it’s value it.”
“Now that we’re again, it is change into 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 just isn’t simple. In order troublesome 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 will 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 carried out, 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 desires, I typically nonetheless need to remind myself that I am doing this. Like, ‘Oh, we have got a present tonight. I’ve obtained 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 is not a dream, that I’ve really obtained someplace to be. I’ve obtained a monitor to put down. I’ve obtained a sound examine 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.