Drop Nineteens, 1991: The lost album of shoegaze nostalgia

Back in the 90s I would watch a Nickelodeon show, The Adventures of Pete & Pete. It was a sensitively aware show that respected its child and youth audiences while showcasing childhood moments of growing up in the adult world, set in a fictional middle-class suburb following two red-head brothers (both named Pete), mixed up in quirky offbeat stories, with equally quirky characters, and fittingly quirky humour. It also had some great music (and musician cameos) too. One of the bands I'd learn about reading end credits whose music was featured, were the Drop Nineteens.

Over time as accessibility to music became easier (controversially) to download/obtain through the internet boom, I was able to get bits and pieces of their catalogue after the band was well and truly a graveyard-band by the time I was onto The Adventures of Pete & Pete.

As the nostalgia tide of the 80s era from the late 2000s-to-late-2010s subsided, the 90s nostalgia wave hit late 2010s, and is still at high tide - but I suspect soon to roll on out within the next 3 years.

As this hit, some bands that had largely been forgotten about, or only continued to have some pulse through cult-followings, all of a sudden were getting spoken about amongst wider audiences they previously would have never been exposed to. Say what you will about Spotify but it certainly has brought a lot of music to peoples radars and hearts, and Youtube too. One of the bands to benefit from this wave and wider reach through the internet and its by-product of music streaming has been the Drop Nineteens.

I will dabble more into the bands history if I get around to writing about their debut album Delaware, as the band does have an interestingly fractured history, but for now lets get straight into this album review and why I've given some background to my discovery of their music and the relevance of nostalgia.

The band re-united (with the exception of founding drummer Chris Roof) in 2022, and in late 2023 released their first album in 3 decades titled Half Light. And it was a very credible comeback album, that was not a cheap shot at making a quick buck with the music avoiding any forced creativity. It meant there was good spirit in the music and no hidden agenda. The band also dusted off cobwebs to hit the live music scene in 2024 playing a small series of shows in the USA.  

On the back of this triumphant return, Greg Ackell (the groups vocalist and rhythm guitarist) dug out mostly forgotten music that was originally intended to be their debut album. The collective we hear was recorded across two-sessions. Half of the sessions would make up the EP Mayfield, and the rest completing the press-kit demos they'd dispatch in search of a record deal - getting out as far as the United Kingdom's music press.

The reason for these songs never seeing the light of day until now? Simply explained, upon their quickly earned opportunity of signing a record deal (to Caroline records) the demos were intended to be re-recorded/produced for their debut. However, as young ambitious musicians they decided to challenge themselves and write new music from scratch. This decision would create Delaware, and the collection of songs that had formed their initial impressions to get recognition? They were scrapped. 

Until 2025.

The band committed to remixing, remastering, and releasing these "forgotten" songs as an album of its own titled, 1991. It is an origins album to the year scribed to the title, and comes at the perfect time for the group and upon an initial listen, a perfect time for yours truly to experience it.

I find the emotion that comes with listening to music that can trigger memories I've lived, or evoke daydreams of memories in moments I've actually never lived, quite overwhelming where I can be taken on a mental trip accompanied by a confronting list of feelings. 1991 did exactly that.

To immerse myself in the listening experience, I received physical copies of 1991 on vinyl and CD. With a new set of headphones I decided to go with the CD for an uninterrupted listen, and slouched back close to my combo cassette/cd/record player and began my listen of 1991. I also wanted to make sure I picked a calm summer evening as the shadows were growing across my backyard and another day in my life was drawing to an end.

When I listened to the bands vinyl re-issue in 2024 of Delaware it included a very detailed and well-written biography of the band that I finished reading as the record finished. It was fitting to read their journey, see it in my mind, as I listened to the album for the first time with an educated perspective on the history of it. For 1991, I just closed my eyes and experienced it as a whole listen and rolled with whatever would come to my mind.

It's surprising given the bands infancy stage how cohesive a listen the music was to me. This reflection of the band perhaps made the effort of bundling it worthwhile, as there is a distinctive sound that flows throughout 1991. All the members were indeed just teenagers, and the textures and approach to the style they were targeting is captured quite organically.

There's songs with shoegaze monotony following steady rhymical patterns as the music swells in and around it, and others with classic layers of reverb and chorus washed together that rinse through your ears making you feel like you're listening to the group playing it live in small rehearsal space track by track. I enjoy that feeling with this music, where there's imperfections in the overall delivery, and a hiss behind the recordings themselves, where it feels like maybe I've discovered a cassette tape by an unknown band - who I will never come to know. My judgement just subsides. There's an innocent approach I can take to the listen. That's also just the era of creating this music, that is how it was done. 1991 gets a massive thumbs up from me that even after whatever mixing and mastering has taken place, it still has that feel. It leads into a listen of Delaware soon after quite fittingly.

Does it have the hooks and immediate pull in songs like "Winona", "Delaware", or "Kick the Tragedy"? Perhaps not as captivating. So one could argue the band did some growth as song-writers following 1991 in the relatively quick creation of Delaware. For those who need a hook, there's definitely moments in tracks that I was quite eager to shoot a repeat listen on. And I do enjoy those "pop" moments in an album when it's hard to recall when it was on initial listen, but the seamless listen does grab you multiple times. It adds to that cohesive quality I wrote about earlier, and means I need to give it another listen. With those relistens an album has another opportunity for songs to grow on you, that on your initial listen maybe you weren't attuned to the emotion it could conjure.

Those songs that grabbed me on initial listen.

"Daymom" has a dreary feel and flow to it which starts the album off. It sets a good indicator on the production you can expect for the rest of the album. It was also one of the stand-alone tracks to be shared as promotion for this bundle. That dreary feel is not criticism either. It's fitting.

"Soapland" has the classic traits of what would have won over UK audiences. Alternative, Shoegaze, and Dream-pop. Paula Kelley's vocal melody pushed back in the mix with excessive echo and reverb circling around an alternatively unsettling monotonous passage of music slowly building up, before delightful opening into a bright space seeing a shift in the mood of the music - a dream-pop opening. This continues into a beautiful outro with her multiple vocal harmonies alone taking the track to fade out.

Songs that fans of heavyweight Shoegaze acts would quickly pin to their favourites playlists by ear-candy can easily identifiable in the tracks "Mayfield" and "Song for J.J". "Shannon Waves" is the other than falls into this space which to my senses was immediately triggering My Bloody Valentine, not that I think it's fair to always compare band-to-band, but they were an established outfit at this time and this track definitely slots into that UK scene. Steve Zimmerman's bass work sits prominent in the mix as its run-time concludes it as an instrumental.

"Kissing the Sea" was probably the highlight for me. I loved the transition at 1-minute 50-seconds, where it shifts from airy/ethereal guitars with Kelley's equally airy voice haunting back of the mix, to a driving floor-tom drum pattern dropping right in as Ackell takes on the lead vocals and the song just swells further around you. Small passages break away into that airiness making for a really fun listen. The tempo is engaging and dare I say the end result is quite a beautiful song at 3:31.

The album closes on a positive feeling, evoking summer optimism by the music alone, aptly titled "Another Summer". It reminded me slightly of the earlier works of The Sundays, with the jangle-pop guitars not shy on reverb/chorus combo, with a marching drum beat with a cracking snare, that trails into a contrasting low end swash following the primary passage of music. The songs near 6-minute duration ends with a 10 second ring out of the instruments. The resulting conclusion, for me, a very satisfying listening experience.

1991 never needed to be brought out of the vault. Sometimes bands egos validate their decisions unjustly which doesn't end up actually meeting expectations nor demand. However, I feel it's not the case with the Drop Nineteens who just seem to be enjoying their new lease on life. There's creative freedom in this era of their rebirth, so much so they may explore writing another LP. I won't reject that listen, just as I didn't reject 1991. A collection of dated songs from a band before they'd cut their teeth. It's part of their history and if credibility is to be served it actually showcases this band had more potential than was realised in their short lived career of the 90s, where they could have definitely run with the heavyweights of Ride, Slowdive, and even won over audiences of My Bloody Valentine or The Smashing Pumpkins, the latter who they'd even toured with but saw that short-lived with a wrecked fan-base growth opportunity due to a blizzard. By the mid-90s they'd dropped off the face of the music world, as did these songs. Then they returned, have been embraced, respected the embrace, and have presented these songs. A great release for all.

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1991 is released via Wharf Cat Records.
At the time of this article it has been released on CD, Vinyl, and Digital.

The band at the time of recording the music that comprises, 1991:
Greg Ackell (vocals, guitar),
Paula Kelley (vocals, guitar/keys),
Steve Zimmerman (bass)
Motohiro Yasue (lead guitar)
Chris Roof (drums)