Plain Ride
Stonebridge
Plain Ride is a Finnish band, led by singer / guitarist / songwriter Janne Westerlund, also known from Circle, Pharaoh Overlord, Chainsmoker, and Sweetheart. Plain Ride was formed in 2004. The music of Plain Ride is neither traditional nor avant-garde. There is present a distinct love for American music, for Folk, Country, and the Blues. There is the hypno-psychedelic Krautrock sensibility. There are the arranged moments and there are the improvised moments. There are a lot of other things. The choice of idiom - genre, style, influences, etc - is circumstantial, meaningless in itself. First and last, there is the need to communicate, by whatever means happen to be at hand. The need to dance, to play, to sing. Staunchly resistant to stylistic nitpickery and genre-spotting as ever, the Finnish five-piece Plain Ride make a point of straddling all ends of the spectrum of Rock, from catchily grooving boogie to arresting melancholy at its barest. The 12 songs on Stonebridge lay a caleidoscopic gaze on the world, where flamboyant panoramas of apocalypse collide with carefully captured stillshots of hope and friendship.