:: The Black Ryder - Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride

The Black Ryder

The Black Ryder have received much hype on the Sydney music scene after touring with the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and The Charlatans over recent years, and are set to create much more following the release of their debut album Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride. The brainchild of singer/songwriters’ Aimée Nash and Scott Von Ryper, Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride is a funny little album. The music is loud, dark rock with a sinister twist and a tendency to completely obliterate the vocals, often drowning them out to a point beyond recognition. Opening track ‘To Never Know You’ is the poster child for this weird musical phenomenon. Trippy guitar and raagini harmonies are utterly ear shattering, making it impossible to hear Nash’s soft-at-the-best-of-times drawl. And while an unsettling but still pleasant experience at first, this deliberate oversight can get incredibly annoying after the third or fourth track. Ignoring this, Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride does have a very unique sound. ‘Outside’ takes a slower and softer line with a beautiful guitar melody that sends shivers down your spine. But then you get to ‘Gone Without Feeling’ and you’re once again confronted with in-your-face music and no vocals, except this time Nash makes things worse by whispering the lyrics in the sort of voice favoured by such horror movie characters as the girl in The Ring. Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride is quite simply a rollercoaster of fascinatingly morose and beautifully bluesy tunes and ear-splitting vocal-less torture. The instrumentals are good, really good, but the vocals are just unbearable. So really you’re split. You can buy The Black Ryder’s debut album, take the ride, enjoy some sonic rock masterpieces and hope the lack of vocals don’t drive you nuts. Or you can steer clear and avoid the risk all together.