Blake Jones and the Trike Shop
“and still…”
Big Stir Records
Big Stir records, the innovative US label which is home to power pop and rock bands such as Sparkle*Jets UK was founded with a roster of just five artists. One of those was Blake Jones and the Trike Shop, a Fresno based band whose 1997 debut album, 'Mad Pop Inventions', bore a title which could adequately sum up the review which will follow. The new album title “and still…” reflects a need to continue with creative endeavours and to collect like-minded souls together even in the fractured state of our times. The line up has Blake Jones working with veterans of the Fresno scene and a classic sound indebted to a radical state of mind rather than a geographical location or time: the likes of XTC, Robyn Hitchcock, The Kinks for example.
Several of the songs on the album are about record shops, how amazing they are, not just for what they sell but the community they create. 'Record Cover Girl' has the singer both advising and warning about his friend’s new crush, “life could be pretty as a picture if you’d just enlist her to fix your life”, but beware of “those little teeth, those carnivorous little teeth” which another girl displays in her picture on the back of a record cover, would real life be better than that? The lyrics and theme recall the whimsy of early Move such as Fire Engine, gentle pop rock with construction more complex than it appears and West Coast harmonies.
It’s not all whimsy: 'Fascist Bumblebee Winter Formal' addresses a local invasion of The Proud Boys, a far-right organisation in the US whose uniform colours are yellow and black. The lyric is about members’ lack of direction, and their need to follow a leader: “You’re used you choose your heroes wrong, You’d do anything just to feel to feel you belong”, to a swinging rockabilly beat. 'Mock Stoner Voices' is a short ditty about a meet-cute back in the day, again in that pivotal record store which is then celebrated in 'Used Record Stores', a Kinks-esque hymn to vinyl discovery and serendipity: “Don’t you adore a used record store?”.
'Dreaming About Sleeping' is a nervous, caffeine-jittery early-XTC style jive about doing the opposite of jiving, “dreaming about the big fluffy pillows” and counterpointed by a soaring theremin led instrumental which follows, You Put Theremin on My Hype Sticker, underlaid with a stomping beat. String Lights and Hold On is a jaunty sounding Christmas song, with the tension of the new year and our losses of the old year, “People missing, people found, The calendar flips round and round”. There’s a flute in the mix, a few clear nods to Jethro Tull in a social commentary, a minstrel in the gallery, “Did the angels promise all that, And the radio just falls flat”.
A late Beatles vibe flows through 'What’s Enough?', as Blake asks simply, what more are we meant to do? In our personal lives, our careers and in trying to change the world. “I was nearly there, I had it in the palm of my hand.”, there’s a touch of Ziggy in the arrangement, a little bit of early Roxy Music perhaps, in the plaintive and longing soundscape. It’s a very English sound, and is followed by The Queen Is Dead (not a cover) a sincerely delivered desire to recall our friends before time passes us by. Mr Saturday Sun is another piece about seizing the moment, a 60s inspired beat pop tune with a heavy bass, ska or dub inspired. Shake Your Dress is a blues rock dance anthem, and the album closes with We Love Our Tower, about a fight to retain the character of Fresno’s creative hub following the pandemic and takeover attempts, bouncy, anthemic and heartfelt.
And Still… is a fun, creatively structured set of songs, all clearly inspired by particular sounds and bands, with great harmonies and arrangements, designed to make clear that the more certain factions try to create conflict, the more the creative, liberal and free-thinking of our world need to stick together. I may be reading too much into it, of course, but reading is one thing you can never do enough of. And buying records.
