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By: Floyd Lee

Artist: Ride

Date: Tursday 29th August 2019

This is not a safe place. Keep your hands in the cart or you may die. The ride begins with Shiva & The Hazards, comprised of Leigh Baines, Douglas Hind and Jet O'Rourke. Shiva being the god of thieves & beggars, we are in good company tonight. The beggars maybe older and wiser but beggars none the less. Begging at the gates of the transcendental moment when sound and mind unite in a nod of acknowledgement. Is life worth living? Ask the music. Shiva walk stage left, to a small but growing crowd, but this isthmus is not Glastonbury to anyone with something to prove. An opening band ready to knock the headline act from the throne.

All eyes are on the guitarist (a young Noel Gallagher) who of small stature, pierces through and takes the reins with Pete Townsend thrusts of restraint and chaos. The crowd grows with each song as the atmosphere draws the people closer. Shiva & The Hazards are no opening band, but a force to be reckoned with. A poptastic psychedelic force at that.

Inquiries are made on the smoker’s deck in the aftermath “Who are those guys?” The brain recovering from Shiva’s tour de force seems to have forgotten about the existence of Google search. Dub bass and the tang of weed lifts as the bells await the return of the mop top knights of Shoegaze, RIDE.

They enter stage right, unassuming and quiet, to a roar of cheers. This is the place. This is the moment. Ride, otherwise known as Andy Bell, Laurence Colbert, Mark Gardener and Steve Queralt, have arrived.

Ride’s opening song reveals the dividing line between support and headline. The sound is fuller, the intricate lead guitar from Andy Bell has a crisp shine that due to pedal costs would be hard to replicate. The ripped fuzz complimented by the silver metallic waves has the room entranced “So this is what Shoegaze was & is”.

Everybody's heads are down except the singer who is overjoyed to be here with a Cheshire cat monkey grin thankful to be alive and playing his music in New Zealand for the first time. It may have taken twenty years but when your partner (Andy Bell) in crime leaves to join Oasis for ten years then all maybe forgiven.

The third song “Seagull” lifts the bar higher dividing the line between headline act and total genius. The tomorrow never knows style drums propel into swirling tornado guitars. The Byrds style harmonies and Hendrix wah wah whirls push the audience forward like a horse refusing a hurdle. From here on we are in the clouds of transcendence if you look through the mist you can see bowl-cut kids, eyes rolling, dancing with their lovers replicating a time they were never alive for. The ghosts are still alive. Who in the crowd will carry this torch on? I saw a few faces that had ears to hear and an intention to take the baton.

The haze speeds time up as you are in the vortex occasionally interrupted by a Viking drum beat of war from a tribal drummer in a polo shirt. The bang of the drum calling all to awake. Choose love and a bell will ring. Keep The dream is alive. Life is just a ride. Just a ride.