“It was an autumn afternoon Sicily, when I left home to check out my friend’s brand new Technics SL-1200 turntable. My mother was under the impression we were doing our homework, but we spent the entire afternoon listening to Black Sunday by Cypress Hill.”
“I immediately fell in love with that album and clearly recall the goose bumps caused by B-Real’s high pitched vocals. It sounded like a hawk on crack, with a runny nose and an arrow up its bottom.
It was mysteriously captivating, beautifully aggressive and assertive. I distinctly remember jumping all over the place in a state of euphoria and excitement when “Insane in the Membrane” came blasting out of the stereo.
The rest of our friends were into dull Italian pop music. The whole “put a record on and smoke some weed” ritual made us feel “different” and super cool and so we started meeting up every day after school. We soon became familiar with the likes of Wu Tang Clan, Public Enemy, Beastie Boys, House of Pain, Nas, and I started to write some songs myself.
Nonetheless, we were two enthused kids in a small town in Sicily in the 90s. To come across a Hip-Hop record wasn’t an easy task in those days and so we had to travel to a bigger city to find a proper vinyl store. That was our “special event”— the train commute all by ourselves, the excitement of the big city, the graffiti art and the people in the streets.
When I moved to Rome a few years later, I met Sandro who introduced me to The Soft Bulletin by the Flaming lips. My life hasn’t been the same ever since. Hearing those songs jumping out of the speakers felt like floating in an enchanted forest in space. Songs such as “Race For The Prize” made me want to run barefoot in the streets and hug strangers.
Suddenly my whole musical world was shaken and I wanted more. I started absorbing as much music as I could, every day, and discovered Pavement, Blur, Radiohead, dEUS, and later on Beta Band, TV on the Radio, Broken Social Scene, Super Furry Animals, Beck.
I used to play guitar at my local church in Sicily when I was a kid, but I knew Sandro wanted to start a band and needed a bass player therefore I bought a cheap bass guitar and joined him…”
—Giuseppe La Mela (vocals/bass/keys)
Turnpike Glow released their debut EP “Inflatable Optimism” on 11th June 2012. The 4-track EP, mixed by Broken Social Scene and Los Campesinos producer Dave Newfeld, perfectly encapsulated their infectious indie pop sensibilities.
