After months of waiting, Marty Ryan aka Anna’s Anchor releases his debut album, ‘Nautical Miles’ album today. It sees Ryan adapting a full-band sound, yet retains his emotional outpouring. Over the course of ten songs, he provides a introspective, earearnest layered record.
Having featured Anna’s Anchor on the site several times, we wanted to give Marty the spotlight once again. We recently spoke to him about five influential songs.
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Into It. Over It – Midnight Carroll Street
It’s probably best to start off with the biggest influence to Anna’s Anchor which is Evan Weiss’ project, Into It. Over It. When I first came across IIOI, it was a project where Evan recorded predominantly full band with a friend playing drums, and doing everything else himself in the studio, he would then tour solo.
At the time I discovered IIOI, I wasn’t happy with the commitment levels of my old band/where it was going and I thought that this was the perfect set up, the songs can sound the way you want them to. If you want to go tour, you can go tour, if you want to do a record, you go do a record. There’s no waiting around for others or ideas meeting resistance. This set up has completely paved the way for Anna’s Anchor, particularly on this record. The songs sound really full despite it just being myself, and then I have all the flexibility that comes with being a solo musician to be as productive and work as hard as possible. On top of all of this, I think Evan is an absolutely genius songwriter, he approaches most things in an unconventional way, never repeats himself and the stories that he’s telling in the songs are delivered in the perfect way. I could talk for days about my love for Into It. Over It.
Interpol – PDA
Another obvious influence, and something I’ve worked on a lot for years, is the use of reverb and delay on the lead guitar to try and create a signature, distinct sound. No one has done this better than Interpol. If someone puts on any Interpol song, you just know immediately that it’s them by the sound of Daniel Kessler’s guitar. It’s ambient, raw, aggressive, beautiful, in your face and every other conflicting adjective I could think of.
The aesthetic that the band have created for themselves makes me love them even more, between the artwork, clothes, sound, videos. It’s just so complete. ‘PDA’ is definitely my favourite song by them. Combines all the elements I spoke about and the change at the end for the outro, just shifts the song completely in a different direction that you didn’t see it going at all and it’s just through three notes and some effects, Amazing!
Brand New – Sowing Season (Yeah)
It’s difficult to pick one Brand New song. ‘The Devil and God…’, and ‘Daisy’ are quite frankly masterpieces. The two things from Brand New that has influenced me the most is their use of loud to quiet dynamics to keep the listener on the edge of their seat the whole time, it makes for the most intense songs and is something I’ve definitely drawn upon on my new record. Secondly, how they can make the heaviest songs without necessarily using heavy sounding guitars has been a game changer for me. The delivery of the vocal lines and how brutally honest they are just makes the songs heavier than anything you can imagine. After listening to a song like ‘Sowing Season’, I feel almost emotionally drained by everything that’s happened in the last four minutes in the best possible way.
Windings – This Is A Conversation
Windings are a band from my hometown in Limerick, Ireland. I’m a firm believer that whilst it’s great to have these big bands from America to look up to, to a certain extent, they’re not real to the world I exist in, so I think my biggest influences, and those that I look up to most are those that I can see at a gig any given time or walking down the street.
Windings are one of the first band I saw that were releasing albums, touring near and far off places completely by themselves and doing it so well! As a teenager, I could physically see and meet these normal guys doing everything I really wanted to do and it gave me a sense of, hang on a minute, I could actually do this too. Aside from that monumental realisation, their music is just sensational. It’s constantly changing, so much so that I’d feel uncomfortable pigeon-holing them as they make whatever type of music they want to make, whenever it suits them and couldn’t care less what anyone else thinks because they know it’s good and means something to them. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be about to release an album if it weren’t for them. Ultimate fan boy!
The Cure – Just Like Heaven
It’s difficult to pick just five influences but I feel like it’d be a poor selection if I didn’t include someone grander of the more classically huge bands that you’d find on such a list. ‘Just Like Heaven’ is one of the most beautiful songs. The lyrics are simple yet masked in metaphors that shape the song in such a mesmerising and thought provoking way. In a certain sense, The Cure combine all the elements that I have spoken about in this article so far, there is the central character at the centre of it all in the form of Robert Smith. The songs are distinct but ever changing. There is a cohesion across their records and an aesthetic of the band, and you get the feeling that they will do what they want as long as it’s motivating them artistically.
‘Nautical Miles’ by Anna’s Anchor is out now on Struggletown Records / Never Meant Records.
