Four-piece band Güero have released the first single from their forthcoming album. ‘Scribe’ sweeps along on currents of pulsing drums from Mike Ruiz and Russell Volksen’s grooving bass. Over these forceful rhythms, Shea Ritche’s keys are hypnotic, rising, falling and repeating while Rik Krull’s ethereal vocals seem to explore the cosmos. The Paul Bates-directed video is well shot and brilliantly edited, so that it tells a story of revenge. The intriguing sub-titles really add to the drama and other-worldly feel of the song and the narrative is well-realised. The Sacramento-based group like to try out new material in the rehearsal room, experimenting, playing live, trying out ideas and working out what riffs, chord progressions and melodies will work together in bursts of collective creativity, often recording as they go on a voice memo app to capture the process. ‘Scribe’ was written this way and the song name reflects the process.
Bass player Volksen says of the song: “We called it ‘Scribe’ because it came from always recording the practices, like the way a scribe was tasked in being the record keeper. The song started just as something that we jammed on, a three-chord progression that Rik had. A week or two later, I was listening to it and thinking, ‘We have to try to make a song out of these riffs because they’re really cool.’ So, I played it for everyone and we kind of were able to grab some of the parts and construct a song using those riffs. It feels like it was the first time we ever did that, where we pulled some random riffs in a jam and said, ‘That’s the intro’, that’s the verse, etc.’ Mike would always yell, ‘Scribe’ impersonating the scene from, ‘Monty Python & the Quest for the Holy Grail’ if we needed to pull up a recording for reference after this.”
Look out for the new album, which is being recorded with producer Akiyoshi Ehara. Based on this single, we can expect more atmospheric, moody music to be absorbed by. Enjoy this and drift away.
