''Almost Here'' is the debut studio album by English

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...

band

Unbelievable Truth Unbelievable Truth were a British rock band, led by Andy Yorke, with Nigel Powell, Jason Moulster, and Jim Crosskey. Their sound has been described as "slow, melancholy, country-tinged ballads, wrapped in a soft blanket of acoustic guitars and ...

. Available on

Virgin Records Virgin Records is a record label owned by Universal Music Group. It originally founded as a British independent record label in 1972 by entrepreneurs Richard Branson, Simon Draper, Nik Powell, and musician Tom Newman. It grew to be a worldwid ...

, catalogue number CDVX2849. Also available on

MiniDisc MiniDisc (MD) is an erasable magneto-optical disc-based data storage format offering a capacity of 60, 74, and later, 80 minutes of digitized audio. Sony announced the MiniDisc in September 1992 and released it in November of that year fo ...

MDV2849 / 7243 8 45155 8 4.

Background

Vocalist and guitarist

Andy Yorke Andy Yorke (born 10 January 1972) is an English musician and former lead singer and guitarist for the band Unbelievable Truth. He is the younger brother of Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke. Early life Yorke began singing when he was ten. At the a ...

and drummer

Nigel Powell Nigel Powell (born 1 October 1971) is an English multi-instrumental musician from Abingdon. Powell was born in Bromley, London, and educated at Abingdon School. While at school he was in a band called Illiterate Hands, which also featured futu ...

met while attending school, with the latter later meeting bassist Jason Moulster through mutual friends. Yorke had been studying

Russian literature Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia and its émigrés and to Russian language, Russian-language literature. The roots of Russian literature can be traced to the Middle Ages, when epics and chronicles in Old East Slavic were c ...

abroad in Russia; while here, he wrote several songs and subsequently asked Moulster to form a band on his behalf so they could work on the material when he returned. Unbelievable Truth formed in 1993. Yorke would take several more trips to Russia over the next few years, offering himself as a interpreter. Unbelievable Truth signed to

in March 1997.Sinclair 1998, p. 48

Composition and lyrics

Musically, the sound of ''Almost Here'' has been described as

soft rock Soft rock is a form of rock music that originated in the late 1960s in Southern California and the United Kingdom which smoothed over the edges of singer-songwriter and pop rock, relying on simple, melodic songs with big, lush productions. S ...

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

reviewer

Stephen Thomas Erlewine Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance writer, occ ...

referred to it as an "alluringly moody record, similar to the epic soundscapes" of

Radiohead Radiohead are an English rock band formed in Abingdon, Oxfordshire, in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke (vocals, guitar, piano, keyboards); brothers Jonny Greenwood (lead guitar, keyboards, other instruments) and Colin Greenwood (bass) ...

and

the Verve The Verve were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Wigan in 1990 by lead vocalist Richard Ashcroft, guitarist Nick McCabe, bass guitarist Simon Jones (musician), Simon Jones and drummer Peter Salisbury. Guitarist and keyboard player Simo ...

, "only with a bit of a country-rock underpinning". ''

PopMatters ''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, fi ...

'' founder Sarah Zupko wrote that it "relies on largely acoustic arrangements and intricate dynamics", with influences from

emo Emo is a rock music genre characterized by emotional, often confessional lyrics. It emerged as a style of and hardcore punk from the Washington D.C. hardcore punk scene, where it was known as emotional hardcore or emocore and pioneered b ...

and ''

Dog Man Star ''Dog Man Star'' is the second album by English alternative rock band Suede (band), Suede, released in October 1994 on Nude Records. The album was recorded in London at Master Rock studios in early 1994, and was produced by Ed Buller. It was th ...

'' (1994) by

Suede Suede (pronounced ) is a type of leather with a fuzzy, napped finish, commonly used for jackets, shoes, fabrics, purses, furniture, and other items. The term comes from the French , which literally means "gloves from Sweden". The term was fir ...

. Yorke said the music is typically written first with the lyrics coming last; Powell said he would take each individual's part and coalesce them together to form a complete song. "Higher Than Reason" evoked the sound of

Jeff Buckley Jeffrey Scott Buckley (November 17, 1966 – May 29, 1997), raised as Scott Moorhead, was an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. After a decade as a session guitarist in Los Angeles, Buckley amassed a following in the early 1990s by ...

and

Nick Drake Nicholas Rodney Drake (19 June 1948 – 25 November 1974) was an English singer-songwriter known for his acoustic guitar-based songs. He did not find a wide audience during his lifetime, but his work gradually achieved wider notice and recognit ...

Release

To promote the "Higher Than Reason" single, the band went on a UK tour in November 1997. In February 1998, they went on another UK tour. "Higher Than Reason" was released as a single in the US on 2 February 1998. ''Almost Here'' was released through

on 11 May 1998. The band promoted it with a launch show at the

Virgin Megastore Virgin Megastores is an international entertainment retailing chain, founded in early 1976 by Richard Branson as a record shop on London's Oxford Street. In 1979 the company opened their first Megastore at the end of Oxford Street and Tottenha ...

in Oxford, prior to a UK tour for the rest of the month. Shortly afterwards, they appeared at

T in the Park T in the Park festival was a major Scottish music festival that was held annually from 1994 to 2016. It was named after its main sponsor, Tennents. The event was held at Strathclyde Park, Lanarkshire, until 1996. It then moved to the disused ...

and

Glastonbury Festival Glastonbury Festival (formally Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts and known colloquially as Glasto) is a five-day festival of contemporary performing arts that takes place in Pilton, Somerset, England. In addition to contemp ...

Reception

Erlewine said Yorke's lyricism can be viewed as "adolescent and the Unbelievable Truth's ambition often outweighs their accomplishments, but the promise they flaunt on their debut proves that they are almost there". Zupko added to this, saying that the band had "sculpted a set of compelling, introspective songs that form a cohesive artistic statement". ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' writer Angela Lewis saw it as a "true beaut of a debut album ..with 11 arresting songs that eschew everything the

Cool Britannia Cool Britannia was a name for the period of increased pride in the culture of the United Kingdom throughout the mid and second half of the 1990s, inspired by Swinging London from 1960s pop culture. This loosely coincided with John Major's conse ...

party has to offer". ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to th ...

'' writer Brent DiCrescenzo said they perform "sylvan, introspective soft-rock that's pretty and pleasant, but too mono-emotional (read: sad)".

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

's Kim Stitzel called it "restrained, mild, kinda pretty, and overwhelmingly inoffensive". Victoria Segal of ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...

'' went further by writing that it was "supernaturally dull, vaporised by its earnestness" and that that it was "useful only as road music for somnambulists, 'Almost Here' will knock you out. Cold." Several reviews compared it to Radiohead; Segal wrote that the band had "enough of a resemblance to Radiohead - serious, sensitive, the usual - to make it unavoidable". DiCrescenzo was not surprised that the band "sounds like a watered-down Radiohead", though felt that Andy Yorke lacked the "intensity, tension, and questionable sanity" of Thom Yorke. Tim Mohr of ''Consumable Online'' dismissed this comparison, stating that the band "don't sound remotely similar to Radiohead", being more inline with Arnold and

Crowded House Crowded House are a rock band, formed in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, in 1985. Its founding members were New Zealander Neil Finn (vocalist, guitarist, primary songwriter) and Australians Paul Hester (drums) and Nick Seymour (bass). Later ban ...

. He goes on to say Andy Yorke's vocal "style is completely his own and shows no trace of Thom". ''

CMJ New Music Monthly CMJ Holdings Corp. is a music events and online media company, originally founded in 1978, which ran a website, hosted an annual festival in New York City, and published two magazines, ''CMJ New Music Monthly'' and ''CMJ New Music Report''. Th ...

'' David Jarman wrote that the album "reveals a promising band that doesn't need to ride on anyone's coattails", though did admit that Yorke "shares some vocal tics with his brother – a lilting tenor, a fondness for quivering and hurt phrasing".Jarman 1998, p. 55

Track listing

#"Solved" – 3:46 #"Angel" – 3:51 #"Stone" – 3:37 #"Same Mistakes" – 3:01 #"Forget About Me" – 3:57 #"Settle Down" – 3:13 #"Finest Little Space" – 3:40 #"Building" – 5:04 #"Almost Here" – 4:08 #"Higher Than Reason" – 4:02 #"Be Ready" – 2:51

References

Citations Sources * *

External links

''Almost Here''
at

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(streamed copy where licensed) {{Authority control 1998 debut albums Unbelievable Truth albums Virgin Records albums