UK shoegaze band Ride return with their new album, Interplay, on March 29th via Wichita Recordings/PIAS. The announcement is accompanied by the album’s first single, “Peace Sign,” out now. Interplay is the follow-up to 2017’s Weather Diaries and 2019’s This Is Not A Safe Place. Produced by the band with Richie Kennedy and mixed by Claudius Mittendorfer.

Thematically, it pairs classic Ride lyrical hallmarks such as escapism, dreams, and the dissatisfaction of modern life with a sense of resilience and perseverance that comes from imploding, then reforming and finding a way forward to their second peak. Guitarist and singer Andy Bell explains: “This album has taken a long time to make, and has seen the band go through a lot of ups and downs; maybe the most of any Ride album. But it has seen us come through the process as a band in a good place, feeling able to shake off the past, and ready to celebrate the combined musical talents that brought us together in the first place.”

With its driving bassline and euphoric 80s-inspired synths and saxophone, “Peace Sign” is the perfect introduction to Interplay. Speaking on the new single, Andy says: “‘Peace Sign’ started life as a jam recorded at Marks’ OX4 studio, in early 2021. We called it ‘Berlin’ and initially it featured Loz on drums, Steve on bass, and myself on a prophet 5 synth. About six months later I got hold of the recording and wrestled it into song form. Lyrically I was inspired by a film called ‘The Alpinist’ about the visionary free climber Marc-André Leclerc. Soon after I’d finished working on the song I remember I was raving to my bandmates about Leclerc at OX4, and a good memory of that time was us all watching that film at Mark’s studio.”

Made up of guitarist/vocalists Andy Bell and Mark Gardener, alongside drummer Laurence “Loz” Colbert and bassist Steve Queralt, Ride was formed in Oxford in 1988; four friends rooted in art-school aesthetics who combined 60s guitar-pop sensibilities with avalanches of noise and driving rhythms. It was a recalibration of indie-rock that would come to be defined as ‘shoegaze’ and with their seminal 1990 debut Nowhere came a run of critical and commercial success that eventually hit the skids in 1996, with intra-band turmoil prompting them to call it a day.

RIDE
Interplay
Wichita Recordings/PIAS

1. Peace Sign
2. Last Frontier
3. Light in a Quiet Room
4. Monaco
5. I Came to See the Wreck
6. Stay Free
7. Last Night I Came
8. Sunrise Chaser
9. Midnight Rider
10. Portland Rocks
11. Essaouira
12. Yesterday Is Just a Song

Pre-order Interplay by Ride HERE