The European – In A Very Real Sense Now
When I was in my old band before East India Youth, we got invited to do a session for Marc Riley on 6Music. Marc played a track by The European and me and Ben, the guitar player, looked at each other like, what’s this? Who is this weird, mad, English guy? It was so well put together and yet so unsophisticated at the same time. We played it in the tour van all the time. The album is quite camp and it’s kind of intellectual in its own weird way. It’s really melancholy and funny, which I think is a brilliant combination. I used to listen to it in the woods, which were filled with wild garlic, so I have this sensory memory of the record. If I smell wild garlic I can put myself back in the shoes of listening to it.

One of East India Youth’s early gigs I asked him to support me and he graciously accepted. We hit it off and started hanging out more and he introduced me to the people at Stolen records, who put out my debut album Total Strife Forever. I lived with him for a while and now we're really good friends. He’s never put another record out as The European, so I've always been a real champion of this record because it totally fits my sensibilities of why I love music. Nobody has heard this record but whoever I give it to pretty much universally loves it. I have to put this record in this list because I want more people to know about it.