With Jack Parsons of The Pretty Littles
The Vasco Era has been one of the more painful, frustrating, enduring, endearing and all encompassing loves of my life.
No one that I’ve seen puts on a live show like them. I don’t know how to describe it without falling into rock and roll tropes: like the train at full speed, shaking violently, hurtling around the bends. That’s what they are like to watch though.
It’s moving. It’s unhinged. It’s a bit unsettling at times for some reason. It’s brilliant. It’s funny. It takes over the whole body. It’s good to drink to. To cry to. To hug to.
They are clearly incredibly talented but it’s never isolating or wanky. No one is phoning it in, or overwhelmed or afraid to put every inch of their being in. They are unequivocally themselves, come hell or highwater.
Watching Vasco at Falls in 2007–on my own and by chance–significantly altered the course of my life. I was, and probably am, hopelessly dependent on others in social situations.
I’m not the decision maker. I’ll change my plans to stay with the collective. Slightly cowardly. But for some reason at 17 I didn’t and I still don’t really know why and it resulted in what can only be described as an epiphany.
It’s a moment I can still see now. I can still see the lights. I can still feel the air. See the vague outlines of the people around me. I can still remember the shock and awe and total inspiration.
I watched them completely transfixed and internally offered myself a firm handshake with plenty of eye contact and made a pact: I want that and I want to do it that way.
I don’t care if it’s rough around the edges. Energy is currency. I want to sweat like that. I want to get lost like that. I want to make others feel like that. I want that.
Previously I didn’t really want that. Or maybe I wanted a version of that but rock and roll became the only thing that made me feel good thereafter.
But they haven’t been an easy band to love. Huge pains in the arse at times.
There was a moment where it was all there for them and they were grabbing it, but at the same time sabotaging it wherever they could. Each album seemed like a ‘fuck you’ to the last one.
‘The Miles EP’ too corny, ‘Oh We Do Like To Be Beside the Seaside’ too personal and too heavy, ‘Oh Sam’ too lofty in its ambition, too heartfelt, culminating in the self-titled album and last (until now!!!!): a masterclass in low fi, disinterested perfection. Loud. Brash. Melodic. Perfect. “I ain’t no Ray Davies and I know that I never was”.
Different bands spring to mind without ever revealing too much about them. The power of Nirvana. The dynamics of The Pixies. The self aware wordplay of Pavement.
The dystopian tenderness of Arcade Fire. Favourite covers scratch away at the picture too – Dylan, Hendrix, Waits and of course, Elvis.
As a fan, it never felt like we were part of the equation. Loved songs left out, sometimes entire albums for years. You could never praise them too much or at all or the walls would come up, resulting in expert level sheepish avoidance.
Songs would be changed mid set, abandoned or openly rebuked. At times It felt strange to love a band that I was never sure loved themselves. At times it felt hard to adore them, to honour how they made me feel. Isn’t that a strange feeling?
None of these things are criticisms. The opposite. They are the gold standard of not being swept up or changed or defined by their band.
Selfishishly, it felt like if the band followed the ‘rules’ more–smiled for the cameras, shook the hands–there’d be a better chance of connecting widely.
But at what cost, eh? It feels like the bands who instantly get what they are striving for lose the artistry required to make anything decent.
That’s a different thing though I guess. Bands aging or achieving some kind of success seems to gravely affect their ability to make good music. But that might be subjective. Probably. Tall poppy. Maybe. Who fkn knows. I just wanted Vasco to keep making music forever.
It felt like the art and the expression was always the most important thing to the band. Which is why they thrived in a sweaty venue or a festival.
There can be a staleness in playing the same songs the same way, over and over again. Not necessarily for the fans, but for the band. This can get in the way of sentiment.
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The band seemed to yearn for feeling by preferencing a haphazard spontaneity. By pushing moments in songs into something experimental. Jumping and presuming the net would appear.
If it didn’t, shrugging and moving on. Intentionally departing from preconceived ideas about their band with each album. But hopefully getting closer to whatever they were searching for. To me it felt like they were never content with any of it.
There was always a desire to keep kicking the can down the road to find a set of songs they could really, finally believe in.
I don’t know any of this of course. This is how it’s felt loving them. When the band plays live it is awe inspiring. Completely captivating. All these constants you see all the time are challenged.
Their instruments sound different. Fucking loud. Fucking heavy. Treated with indifference but never bad. The playing is angular. Always energy. Always vibe. Never conceited. Never precious. They sound the same on every PA. On every stage. Sid’s voice. The howl. The scream. The haunting, climbing, breaking vibrato.
There is a working class brilliance to their approach. And the connection has endured. There were brilliant bands around them. Bands that have finished up. Disintegrated. Disappeared.
Vasco have survived with fuck all output, because they are unforgettable.
And the new album? It’s different. A complete redefinition. A byproduct of discontent. A gem of exploration. A reason to keep creating. It is a masterpiece. Sorta breathtaking. Like quite magical, honestly. It grabs a hold of you. It’s the train. It’s the tracks. It’s the speed and of course it’s the crash. The breakdown. The rebuild.
The Vasco Era are one of the great pains in the arse. But here they are.
Words by Jack Parsons
