AS I RACED AROUND FROM ROOM TO ROOM

Back about 15 years ago, some publisher/editor asked me to list my influences for her website.  I listed a bunch of artists, of course, some musical genres and Henry Frayne.  Awesome guitarist, unequaled in the delay and reverb.  Spooky, spooky shit.

 

I corresponded with him briefly about 20-25 years ago, still have some M7X promo posters that he sent me tucked away in my boxes of vinyl.

 

Area was good, sort of a gothy/drum machine/4AD thing going on but Lynn has an amazing voice and Henry did something different for just about every song.  I think the band did one album after he left, I never bothered checking it out.

 

Lynn and Henry got back together for The Moon Seven Times, plus a real drummer and much fuller bottom end to their sound.  The first album is a classic.  I see it get lumped in the dreampop or ethereal wave genres all the time, but it transcends them.  Stellar music.  2^nd album is almost as good.  I’m not sure, but it seems to me that Henry may have begun to lose interest on the 3^rd album, as there are big chunks of it that are missing his effects pedals.  Without him, the band sounds like your basic mid-90s alterna-folk group, maybe some jazz and country thrown in.  Nothing horrible, but a huge comedown after the first two albums.

 

Henry made his side project, Lanterna, his full-time project after M7X packed it in.  Just his guitar, an ARP synth and a steady ricochet between real drummers, programmed drums and no drums at all.  The first album, again, is a classic.  An insane variety of sounds and moods.  The 3^rd album, SANDS, is another massive career highlight.  the 5^th album came out in 2006 and then the next one wasn’t released until 2015, so he’s not insanely prolific. 

 

The sound seems to move around in a no-man’s land between post-punk and ambient.  Remember the earliest stuff by Durutti Column?  That’s one reference point.  He goes in a thousand different directions from there.  Awesome graphics from M&X on also.  Lanterna, in particular, has excellent packaging design and photography.

 

Good stuff.