a response to ‘Ixora’ by Copeland.

Moments…

Brief encounters in time that we all experience, the vast majority with no lasting footprint on our minds or lives that are over within the blink of an eye.
Sometimes they’re physical and sometimes they exist purely in the caverns of your mind. Most of the time however, you are unable to coherently put into words just what has happened and just how you feel.

The first time I properly got into Bruce Springsteen for example. I listened to nothing but The Boss’ tracks for around three weeks, nothing else graced the canals of my ears. When I wasn’t listening to Bruce, I was thinking about listening to Bruce, searching for and dissecting lyrics as the connection between myself and his music grew.

The strangest thing happened when I listened to bands music that was a main staple in my musical diet after this. I didn’t know if I liked it anymore, to this day I have no idea how to explain that sensation.
‘This isn’t as good as Springsteen, and this isn’t Springsteen so why listen to it?!’ I pondered.
Bruce Springsteen made me reevaluate everything, and for a brief moment during most weeks, he still does.

July 23rd 2013, Millennium Stadium, Cardiff – the greatest night of my life. Bruce was around an hour late coming onto stage, most crowds would get angry and start to become infuriated. Not us, friends. We were increasingly pumped, the excitement of the imminent arrival of the worlds greatest live performer was unexplainable and was growing, chants started and beer flowed.
Then, the lights were shut out and Dusty Springfield’s cover of ‘Can I Get a Witness’ was introduced through the airwaves.
It was happening, a god was coming and his congregation were ready.
Minds were temporarily lost, and then temporarily found when one by one, the members of The E Street Band climbed the steps to the stage.
Minds were temporarily lost (I Know mine was) once again when with his great presence, unassuming demeanour and guitar in hand, Bruce Springsteen announced himself to Cardiff.
I was literally awestruck for around a minute, I had never experienced anything like it before, and I have never experienced anything like it since.
I’m not a religious man, but it was the closest thing to a religious moment I will ever experience.

The brief moment when you first wake up in the morning and have no grasp on reality, where there is a umbrella temporarily over you protecting you from the rain, then the day, with a huge gust of wind announces itself and blows away the umbrella.

When you’re completely awake but your mind wanders of for a few seconds, you were someplace else but you don’t know where you were or why you were there.

The moment when you’re falling asleep and you drift into that place, half awake, half asleep where the infinite space is full, where the silence is deafening and where the darkness is clear.

They are the anomalies, powerful, unexplainable and they are brief.

From time to time, vehicles arrive that allow you to experience a moment for just that little bit longer. Take alcohol for example, I feel no shame when I say that it is truly wonderful. That place it takes you to. You arrive there, where everything is gonna be all right even know that you’re just borrowing happiness from the next day because you’ve drank far too much and hot damn you’re gonna suffer tomorrow.

I’ve had it multiple times in Thailand, mainly on Koh Chang where the vehicle (no it wasn’t in the pick up truck back from Ting Tongs) was the people I was sharing the moment with – emotional and special. You know whilst you’re there in the company of giants that come a day, a month, fifty years from that moment, you can look back, smile and feel the emotional warmth rise just like I did in ’14.
Where the sudden surge comes from, and when it chooses to arrive are concepts hard to understand and portray, but there is something around you that is the enabler.

One of my latest moments, was when I listened to ‘Ixora’ by Copeland. Ixora is beautiful.

I didn’t know too much about Copeland, I knew that they had broken up six years prior and this was their first album since suddenly reuniting earlier on in the year, the announcement came on April fools…

I downloaded the album, not really knowing what to expect..

After listening to the first three songs I was blown away, I remember thinking at the time ‘this is something special’. And boy, was I right – the rest of the album was on equal footing with greatness.

I’ve listened to Copeland’s other offerings and this album countless more times since and Ixora is indeed special.
There are few ‘perfect’ albums, albums where rather than skip one or two tracks, every one means something and has lasting value and power.
Brand New’s ‘Deja Entendu’, Springsteen’s ‘Darkness on The Edge of Town’, New Found Glory’s ‘Sticks and Stones’ and Valencia’s ‘We All Need a Reason To Believe’ are some of mine.

I can now add Ixora to this prestigious list. Ixora, to me is my mind being unravelled and then played out in musical form.
Ixora’s songs, like the mind are simple and complex at the same time. Aaron Marsh’s vocal range and the music is quite simply breathtaking. With subtle and colossal instrumentation constantly fluctuating, combined with powerful lyrics that are current and relatable and just for that brief moment enable the physical manifestation of things in your mind’s eye.

You’ll listen to a song one day, you’ll think about something one day. However the next time you listen to that song or muse over that thing, they can reborn with a greater significance than before.

Copeland extend, and that is something special.

Once again, taken to the place where the space is full, where the silence is deafening and where the darkness is clear, the place where we all go to but are at an odds to explain its whereabouts.

Not many bands or people do something because of a passion to do something. A lot of music is just put out there to chase the yankee dollar with no real consideration for what is being constructed, no emotion put into the lyrics or real craft of creativity put into the music.

No catchy chorus, no point…

Very rarely nowadays is there any real attachment from either the artist or the fans to a latest musical offering, next week there will be a new flavour of the week with last week’s forgotten. Rather than create something beautiful and connected that will transcend to something far greater than just instruments and words, and something deeper than just a listening experience like a carefully crafted album, the focus will only be on sales of singles often with a new one released far too frequently.

So many moments come and go, forgotten within a flash, so when one comes along, sustained for that little bit longer and makes you feel, have a moment.

‘A billion stars and here we are’.