Various Artists - Feedback to the Future
(Mobile)
Glaring at the stack of promotional band bios received this month, it looks like the spectacular early-90s genre cul-de-sac of shoegazing is currently being cited as an influence on everyone and their friggin brother, so this little European release promising “a compilation of eleven shoegazing songs from 1990-1992” offers the chance for both a timely and welcome glance back at the original crop.
Unfortunately, the problems begin with the tracklisting. The compilers took a rather limited approach in assembling this album, focusing almost exclusively on known hitmaking quantities like Ride, Slowdive, Swervedriver, and Lush. In fact, Americans Drop Nineteens are the sole non-Brit representatives with their satisfyingly seasick “Winona,” and their inclusion only serves to highlight the absence of peers operating outside of England: Lilys, Ecstasy of St Theresa, etc.
To their credit, the folks behind Feedback to the Future did look past the greatest hits in order to toss in a number of moderately rare—yet still representative—B-sides and EP tracks from Moose (“Last Night I Fell Again,” the band’s transitional single between their noisier and poppier periods), Ride (“Like a Daydream”), and the Telescopes (the laconic psych of “All a Dream”). An inessential nod to the collector, but appreciated nonetheless.
The main problem with this comp is as a total listening experience. There’s a fair amount of chaff included in the mix, as the decidedly lesser selections from Adorable, Revolver, and Swervedriver cross the often ill-defined line between forward-thinking shoegaze and simply noisy/effects-heavy guitar pop. Really, while there are certainly gems on here, the deadly combination of misfires and largely obvious band choices means that there’s nothing to hook the newcomer and no revelations for anyone with more than a passing familiarity with the genre; it plays like one (wo)man’s personal mixtape of faves. Feedback to the Future is deeply flawed in both conception and execution, a comp with an unfortunately narrow view of its subject, more notable for its omissions than for its inclusions.
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