I decided to head to Wikipedia, to see what became of Coalesce. I know they had a reunion about ten years ago, and assumed they vanished again, as quickly as they reemerged.
I was right.
However, while reading that, I clicked onto the page for their vocalist, Sean Ingram. And while there, I read that one of his biggest musical influences was none other than Phil Anselmo (drunken racist who also happens to be one of the greatest frontmen ever. The world isn’t black and white. Well, I guess it is to him…)
The source for that was an interview, from about 2001, with Verbicide Magazine, which may or may not exist these days. I doubt it, if the page was archived. I just can’t bring myself to actually find out. Effort.
And while there, I read that he was at the time listening to:
Radiohead, Higher Burning Fire, Lisa Loeb, Tool, A Perfect Circle, Jimmy Eat World. Also a lot of stuff Ed Rose gives me, but I never get band names on those tapes.
Okay, I’ve heard of most of them. But Higher Burning Fire? New to me. But Ingram is a man of fine taste. So I thought…
I’ll check them out.
And I am doing. They’re great! Pretty delicate American indie for the most part. Softer Weezer, harder American Football. Really nice arrangements. Maybe I wouldn’t have loved them when I was 20, mind, so perhaps finding them now is for the best.
But as I listen to them, seeing on Spotify that they average 40 listeners per month. I get to thinking. When they get their 5 cents a month or whatever, do they notice the royalties? Does it warm their collective heart a bit, thinking that people are still checking them out? Or are they bitter, thinking about how much they gave to their one album, that it should have made them stars, so those tiny cheques hurt, like microscopic daggers plunging into their everlasting souls?
For all I know, they’re all in Coldplay. Or they’re ghostwriting Maroon 5 and Sam Smith. But I don’t think so. I think they’re carpenters, baristi, data scientists and maybe there’s a dead one. And they smile inside when they see someone new has discovered their album, 18 years later. Apart from the dead one.
throughsilver in blog 