How To Make Friends By Telephone. Librarians with Hickeys

A telephone, who has one these days? Less and less people my age, let alone younger, I know. And an operator? I think I've used one once, in the middle of the desert somewhere in the nicks of the Northern Territories in Australia. And yes, the kind lady helped me find my mother on her birthday who was staying with friends somewhere in Victoria at the same time. So, yes, a friend forever in my memory.

Librarians With Hickies sing about a telephone old style and an operator in a song that in sound and intent sounds like songs from the time when people had a landline connection and in some countries could call an operator for assistance. Like me the duo's members will have active memories of those days as well.

If anything, the music on How To Make Friends By Telephone makes me feel good. It brings back fond memories of great songs from the past and adds a whole album filled with new ones that add a lot to what already exists. The band is on a constant quest for the perfect pop song and seems to have that holy grail sitting on its dresser as a permanent fixture.

Librarians with Hickeys is a band from Akron, Ohio and consists of guitarists and almost all else, Mike Crooker and Ray Carmen, with the latter having that voice that complements this music no little. Two years ago the band debuted on this blog with the album 'Handclaps And Tambourines', see the post of 16 October 2022. It's first album is from 2020, 'Long Overdue'.

Press photo

Where does the story of the music on How To Make Friends By Telephone start? In the middle of the 1960s with The Byrds' cover of Bob Dylan's 'Mr. Tambourine Man'. That jangly sound on the Rickenbacker guitar played by, then, Jim McGuinn, copied by everyone and not in the least by George Harrison, while The Byrds blended their folk background with The Beatles' pop sound (and Dylan's lyrics to go full circle). Where The Byrds soon went towards country, I would say that Gene Clark's first solo album, 'Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers', comes next. All this makes How To Make Friends By Telephone a near anachronistic album, were it not that the quality can easily compete with the best of The Byrds and Gene Clark. Librarians with Hickeys took the turn towards pure pop and kept Clark's melancholy atmosphere. At the same time the band is not afraid to explore a more uptempo rock version of its music as e.g. in 'Mirror' and the organ fuelled 'Spying By The Numbers' that moves into Johnny Rivers' territory ('Secret Agent Man').

It is almost uncanny how familiar How To Make Friends By Telephone sounds, while the songs are all new to me. This duo does a lot right on this album and even better than on its previous effort. That was nice, this is top of the bill. Yesterday, I've read in an article that The Cure's Robert Smith was in a hurry in 1989, as he thought all songwriters produced their best work before their 30th birthday. He and a lot of other artists know better today. I have no clue what Mike Crooker and Ray Carmen wrote before their 30th birthday, I do know about today. How To Make Friends By Telephone is a great album.

Wout de Natris - van der Borght

You can listen to and order How To Make Friends By Telephone here:

https://bigstirrecords.bandcamp.com/album/how-to-make-friends-by-telephone