Mick Thomas’ Roving Commission’s new album is all done and dusted and set to be released June 19 (on digital platforms) and June 26 (LP and CD). Written and recorded in lockdown, See You On the Other Side: A Postcard from April 2020 features seven songs, including “See You When I’m Looking At You”, the nine-minute chain song Mick conceived in early April and spent a month working on with friends Angie Hart (Frente), Nick Barker, Vikki Thorn (The Waifs), Darren Hanlon, Shelley Short, Alana Jagt, Brooke Russell, Van Walker, Ron S. Peno (Died Pretty), Alannah Russack (The Hummingbirds), Ben Salter, Dana Gehrman, Cam Butler & Jen Anderson.
The album will be released digitally as well as on LP and CD. Mick has a number of bundles available to pre-order, including one which contains ten copies of the album delivered and a forty minute, ten song Zoom concert for ten people. Full details are available at www.mickthomas.com/albums-sales/
The album’s tracklisting is as follows:
1. See You When I’m Looking at You (radio edit) 03:58
2. Rainbows and Bears 04:03
3. Round 14, 2009 04:58
4. I Heard Sally Singing 03:48
5. Ghost Train to Mernda 04:23
6. Mint Condition 02:41
7. See You When I’m Looking at You (full version) 08:51
Mick explains how the songs all came together after he started working on the epic song. “I had thought to send it to Sal Kimber who I then remembered was pretty much going into labour around this time and I got to thinking how long ago her show at the Merri Creek Tavern seemed (it was only about two weeks previous – March 13). This gave me the idea for the tune ‘I Heard Sally Singing’. Then the weekend after the footy was cancelled I turned on the telly to see the first of the classic matches they were replaying was ‘Round 14, 2009’ and I recalled a throwaway song I had written by that name last August and so it was time to get that one up to speed. ‘Rainbows and Bears’ came easily enough as I walked around Northcote each afternoon, and then one evening walking home past the railway my daughter commented that the trains were empty – even though there had been people on the platform. They just seemed to vanish onto the train. Maybe it’s a ghost train I said. Where was it going? she asked and I answered Mernda (because it was). ‘Ghost Train to Mernda’ – sometimes it’s the title that drives the song. We released the single ‘Mint Condition’ in the middle of the lockdown to coincide with the release of the short form drama series of the same name so its place on the record was assured.
See You On the Other Side: A Postcard from April 2020 is out June 19 (on digital platforms) and June 26 (LP and CD)
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