Ever stumbled upon an album described by its own creator as 'dull, numb, and vacant' and felt an irresistible urge to listen? That's exactly what happened to me with Suburban Tours by Rangers, the brainchild of Joe Knight. But here's where it gets intriguing: this seemingly unflattering description, tucked away in an interview with The Wire, was the very thing that piqued my curiosity. How could such words not only fail to deter but actually entice? To unravel this paradox, we need to rewind to the late 2000s and early 2010s, a period when the music world was undergoing a quiet revolution. And this is the part most people miss: genres once relegated to the background—chillwave, hypnagogic pop, and the sadly underappreciated 'glo-fi'—were suddenly thrust into the spotlight. Artists like James Ferraro, Oneohtrix Point Never, and Emeralds were resurrecting the spirits of New Age and yacht rock, while hauntologists in the UK were sampling the forgotten sounds of library music and radiophonics. The uncool became cool, the bland became bold, and the background stepped into the foreground. This phenomenon, philosophers might call it a 'transvaluation,' flipped conventional notions of what constitutes 'good' music on their head. Suddenly, terms like 'bland' or 'slick' weren't insults but invitations to rethink, to dare to listen counterintuitively.
By 2010, when I finally heard Suburban Tours, I wasn’t met with the dullness Knight had described. Instead, the album buzzed with an exciting, tingling energy—a DIY masterpiece crafted on shoestring equipment, far removed from the polished studios of mainstream rock. Yet, I could see what Knight meant: there’s a serene, almost vacant glide to the sound, like drifting through a sun-drenched suburban landscape. Recorded in San Francisco, the album oddly evoked Texas, Knight’s home state, with its frazzled guitar tones mirroring the sprawl of the Sun Belt. The track titles themselves—'Deerfield Village,' 'Bear Creek,' 'Golden Triangles'—are nods to the subdivisions and malls of his youth, places that replaced wilderness with neatly plotted neighborhoods. But here's where it gets controversial: does this album romanticize the suburbs, or does it expose their soullessness? Rush’s 1982 single 'Subdivisions' comes to mind, with its lonely teenage protagonist trapped in a grid of conformity. Yet, Suburban Tours finds bliss in the blandness, tapping into a mood that’s both anomic and reverie-like.
Knight’s guitar work is the album’s crown jewel, a fusion of influences from Eddie Van Halen to Maurice Deebank, Robert Fripp to Johnny Marr. His use of a $99 Digitech multi-effects processor and GarageBand transforms what could’ve been lifeless tracks into a shimmering, woozy dreamscape. The rhythm section, with its sprained funk and gated drum pads, adds a makeshift charm that feels both solitary and communal. Is this the ultimate guitar album of the last 15 years? I’d argue yes, but what do you think?
Suburban Tours isn’t just a snapshot of Knight’s nostalgia for Texas; it’s a vessel for anyone’s yearnings. It captures the interstitial mood of 2010—a time of economic uncertainty, political gridlock, yet a strange sense of idyll compared to today. For me, it was a soundtrack to my own transition from New York’s East Village to suburban LA, a shift from bustling streets to raccoon-patrolled sidewalks. But here’s the question I leave you with: Does Suburban Tours merely reflect its era, or does it transcend it? Is it a time capsule, or a timeless exploration of the mundane turned magical? Let me know in the comments—I’m eager to hear your take.
