Pattern-Seeking Animals Return with 'Friend of All Creatures'
The quartet's fifth album is a friend to all lovers of melodic prog rock.
Thank you for spending part of your day with Michael’s Record Collection. Back in mid-October of 2023, I spoke with Spock’s Beard bassist Dave Meros about his other excellent progressive rock project, Pattern-Seeking Animals, a vehicle for the songs of talented multi-instrumentalist and songwriter John Boegehold. At the time, PSA was about to release its fourth album, Spooky Action at a Distance. A little over a year later, PSA is back, with a new album slated to drop on Feb. 14. I recently spoke with Boegehold about the fifth Pattern-Seeking Animals album, Friend of All Creatures.
Let’s get to that story.
Pattern-Seeking Animals seemingly just came out with their outstanding fourth album, Spooky Action at a Distance, but a little over a year has managed to sneak past since then. The band — largely a vehicle for the songs of composer and multi-instrumentalist John Boegehold, featuring current and previous members of progressive rock veterans Spock’s Beard — is back with fifth album Friend of All Creatures, another pleasingly melodic (yet proggy) offering from the quartet.
The album features a good mix of tight, concise songs and longer tracks that manage to avoid overindulgence while still delivering a mixture of interesting and adventurous yet accessible music. The album will drop Feb. 14 from Giant Electric Pea, a new label for the band, which previously worked with Inside Out Music.
Boegehold wrote the music and lyrics and plays keyboards, guitars, while adding various programming on the album. Ted Leonard (Enchant, Spock’s Beard) provides his usual top-notch lead vocals and plays guitar. Dave Meros (Spock’s Beard, Eric Burdon, Iron Butterfly) plays bass, with Jimmy Keegan (ex-Spock’s Beard) on drums and backing vocals. Diane Boothby was recruited again to add backing vocals, with Eliza James playing violin on a couple of tracks.
As with Spooky Action at a Distance, Friend of All Creatures was mixed and mastered by Frank Rosato at Woodcliff Studio in Sherman Oaks, California. Keegan’s drums were recorded there as well, with most of the other contributions coming from the musicians’ home studios. Boegehold arranged the songs and produced the record.
Friend of All Creatures shares some musical DNA with Spock’s Beard — particularly The Oblivion Particle to my ears — owing to the performers involved, but it is very much its own thing. Intricate arrangements, skilled musicianship, and accessible melodies collide to bring forth an album that may find an audience even among listeners who aren’t into progressive rock’s longform songs with their stereotypical strange time signatures, tempo changes, explosive technical playing, and lack of repetitive chorus hooks. This PSA record’s longer songs don’t feel like a big time investment. The bulk of the tracks plant memorable earworm hooks in the brain and allow the musicians to shine without showing off.
Boegehold trims the fat from even his longest progressive rock songs by testing them with playbacks. If he finds his mind wandering during a section, he assumes the listener will also start to drift, so he cuts it from the song.
“I have a lot of musical weaknesses. I can list all the things I can’t do musically, because there are a lot of them,” Boegehold said. “One thing I think I’m good at is editing and arranging. You’ve got to be just brutal. Take no prisoners with cutting stuff.”
There aren’t as many “story songs” on Friend of All Creatures as there were on Spooky Action at a Distance. The lyrical themes on the new album are sometimes related to imagery and at times are more introspective, but they’re not necessarily personally introspective to Boegehold, who said he was more trying to convey the kinds of thoughts that are universal.
“I try and write lyrics that — especially on this album — don’t necessarily have a concrete meaning to them, but are more evocative, and, again, more imagery, where the listener can kind of ascertain what they think the meaning of it is,” Boegehold said. “Just like the old Yes and Genesis stuff. You know, most of the time we had no idea what any of that stuff meant, but it was cool. It was more introspective in what I wanted to evoke — that kind of feeling — because I almost never write anything based on my feelings or stories only, because I just figure I have a very boring life.”
The album opens with “Future Perfect World,” a mini epic just under 10 minutes long. All four musicians announce their presence in the intro before a bouncy keyboard pattern kicks in with a tone straight out of Tony Banks’ playbook. It sounds like it could have come from an early Genesis album in terms of its sound palette, but it’s probably more playful and happy than anything the legendary Banks ever wrote.
“That’s the first riff I came up with for that album. I just kept playing that riff,” Boegehold said. “I like that organ sound and obviously Tony Banks is my number one influence of all time. I was going for that or a Keith Emerson sound. And a couple times I thought, ‘That’s too derivative. It sounds too much like a Keith Emerson riff or Tony Banks’ — the sound anyway. And I tried a few different sounds and it turned out to be perfect for that (song).”
Another synth joins the pattern, Meros’ bass thrums into the mix, and the music builds momentum. Leonard’s distinctive vocals appear a couple minutes into the song, joined by choral backing vocals that are a brilliant staple of Pattern-Seeking Animals songs. As Keegan wasn’t available to do backing vocals as he usually does, Boegehold said most of the backing vocals on the album are Leonard, Boothby, and a little of himself at times.
There are seemingly so many layers of keyboards over the bass, drums, and acoustic guitars that it’s hard to see how the band might pull the song off live without leaving out something interesting. One of the album’s best guitar solos kicks in and then is echoed by vocals that sing the solo before melting away and leaving the guitar to emerge again. Flute samples from Boegehold lead into the bridge with its overlapping lead/choral vocals. A dizzying keyboard and bass pairing takes the song from the bridge back into verses repeated from earlier in the song. It’s quite an opening statement for the album and a song that continues to grow on me with repeated listens.
The second track, “Another Holy Grail,” is the album’s longest song at nearly 12 and a half minutes, but it’s a fast 12 minutes. Leonard’s voice is spotlighted in the opening lines, pushing him out front from the start.
There are things that we can’t see
Like oxygen and gravity
And as we breathe
We’re swayed by hidden forces
The song takes the listener on a trip through a variety of moods, tempos, and instrumentation, starting with about a four-minute instrumental section in 7/4 that Boegehold said grew from a one-minute riff from “These Are My Things” on the band’s self-titled debut.
“I originally wrote it for Spock’s but a totally different version,” Boegehold said. “But that version had this little one-minute section, which I always loved. It’s just a riff. At first I thought about writing it like kind of a rock song along the riff. And then it just turned out to expand and expand and expand, and all of a sudden, this instrumental section was four minutes. But I didn’t want to start with an instrumental section, so I wrote the beginning (vocal) part. I'm really happy with the way that song turned out. I think the one I’m the most proud of on that album.”
It’s a cinematic epic that many progressive rock fans will find pleasing, but it’s got the patented PSA melodic accessibility. There are vintage-sounding keyboards, some standout drumming by Keegan — some of his best on the album — and orchestral flourishes in the background that add depth and texture. It ends on a big crest, which contrasts nicely with the start of the next track.
“In My Dying Days” shows off the violin talents of James and is one of the catchiest songs on the record. Lyrically, “In My Dying Days” isn’t so different than a lot of other songs about man wrestling with his own mortality. However, rarely is the subject treated so melodically, as these kinds of songs tend to use more minor chords and have darker atmospheres.
“I guess it was about as you get older, and I've written about it a few times, where you think, ‘Well, what’s going to happen to me when I die?’, which is a universal thought of spirituality,” Boegehold said. “But I’m as non-religious as you can get. However, I love the imagery.”
“Down the Darkest Road” begins with a string and flute arrangement and is probably my early favorite on the record. Gorgeous violin and plucked strings blend sweetly with keyboards and Leonard’s vocals (along with layered backing choral vocals) to create a melodic-yet-melancholy-filled song with a slightly creepy vibe.
This song, which is one of my favorites from the record, almost didn’t make the album. It’s a bit different than anything else on Friend of All Creatures. The song has no drums or bass and just some acoustic guitar, violin, and sampled strings. It was also the last song added.
“I had the album done, and there’s one little section in that song which is from a film cue I wrote,” Boegehold said. “I was listening to some old stuff, trying to find something for someone who wanted this music they did with me like 20 years ago, and I came across this cue from this movie I scored, and it sounded like a really cool riff and a cool chord progression — but a very short section, like 20 seconds or something like that. So, I started messing with it, and all of a sudden it’s becoming a song. And it’s like, ‘Oh, this is too good. I’ve got to put this on the album.’ But the funny part is, half of that cue I wrote it from didn’t even end up in the final song. It just all kept on expanding and expanding.”
“The Seventh Sleeper” opens with a keyboard sequence and a little percussion and gently settles into a slow synthesizer riff over the sequence, with full drums and bass kicking in to fill out the sound in the opening minute. It soars a bit when the guitar comes in before quieting again to allow space for Leonard’s vocals in the verse. There’s a terrific guitar solo about halfway through that isn’t flashy but suits the song well. Mellotron washes and mellotron flute provide more texture, with everything flowing together seamlessly. It was one of the few songs on the record that seemed more of a story song than an introspective thing, so I asked about that.
“I had the image of this guy walking up the mountain, going to ostensibly find the seven sleepers,” Boegehold. “And all of a sudden, he gets to the top and he sees them there. Standing next to him, the guy pulls out a gun. So, it’s obviously not the biblical characters, but I just figured it was some weird kind of mystical thing, because then they disappear into the night or whatever. I’m not even sure what the hell any of that means. Again, it’s just imagery.”
Leonard’s vocals in the “Seems they danced to the rhythm of life” section induces goosebumps. The way he delivers the line “music of the spheres” just ahead of the backing vocals chiming in is one of the best vocal moments on the album for me.
“Days We’ll Remember” is a soaring, melodic ballad and the shortest song on the album at just under four minutes. Leonard’s vocals shine everywhere, but especially on this track, which is perfectly suited for his pitch and timbre. It’s got uplifting and positive lyrics that show an awareness of living through good times while still in the moment. They present a good reminder to live in the present and recognize the good around us.
These are days we’ll remember
When the pictures and words fade
Touched by times that drew us together
They will live in us always
This song originally appeared on the bonus disc for the most recent (to date) Spock’s Beard album, Noise Floor, but Boegehold put a new spin on it for Friend of All Creatures.
“For two reasons, I wanted to redo it,” Boegehold said. “One, I wasn't happy with the way it turned out, for various reasons I won't go into, and I wasn't crazy about it. And it also ended up on the bonus disc, which is, you know, a musical graveyard. If you look on Spotify, the main disc songs might have 10,000 plays. The bonus disc songs might have 1,000.
“So, if it would have been on the main album, I wouldn't have redone it. But it’s one of my favorite things I’ve written in a long, long, long time, so I wanted to give it another shot. So, I rearranged it. I changed the chorus a bit. I changed a couple of the words. I wrote a new bridge for it and instrumental stuff. And I’m just really happy with the way it turned out on this album. I rearranged it to fit the other material on the album.”
As big a fan of Spock’s Beard as I am, I find the Pattern-Seeking Animals version of “Days We’ll Remember” to be a more vibrant and memorable track. This wasn’t new territory, as Boegehold did the same thing to the Spock’s Beard bonus song “Bulletproof” from Noise Floor on Spooky Action at a Distance. Boegehold said there won’t be any more Noise Floor songs done by Pattern-Seeking Animals, however, as he is happy the way his other songs turned out for Spock’s Beard, although he did not rule out completely reimagining a previous song and doing it in a new way.
“Words of Love Evermore” starts with a simple bass pattern, adding some gentle keys. The music is a bit dark and creepy to start but morphs into a guitar-driven full band section and finally into Leonard’s cheerier lead vocal, punctuated by more lovely choral backing vocals.
The interesting thing about the song to me is not just that the music goes from darker to lighter, but the lyrics do as well. It’s a love song, but the narrator begins each verse with something darker and more negative.
One day I’m gonna stare into the sun
Till it burns out all these
Cobwebs and muddy water
That clouds my thoughts about you
“The verse lyrics I had from an old song that never went anywhere, and I wanted to use them again,” Boegehold said. “So, I wrote that section of the song first and wrote the song around that. It’s obviously a love song, a breakup song, and eventually he just wants to hear words of love, never war, or whatever. I’m happy the way that turned out, too. Ted played some great solo guitar parts at the end of that song.”
The album ends on such a high note, with a prolonged, mostly instrumental outro section, including Leonard’s soaring, emotional guitar and beautiful, uplifting chorus vocals.
Words of love evermore
Words of love never war
It’s the perfect closing track, as it compels the listener to hit the play button again and start the journey over from the beginning.
Friend of All Creatures is a journey worth taking over and over. Pattern-Seeking Animals continue to refine the character of their music. They may share a great deal of musical DNA with Spock’s Beard, but these musicians have carved out a unique identity for themselves as a group making fresh-sounding, melodic, accessible progressive rock that gives the classics a nod and a wink without stealing from or trying to emulate them.
Although I can hardly wait to hear what the band comes up with next, it’ll be an enjoyable wait with such an album to explore in the meantime.
Tracklist:
1. Future Perfect World (9:42)
2. Another Holy Grail (12:20)
3. Down the Darkest Road (4:37)
4. In My Dying Days (4:42)
5. The Seventh Sleeper (8:14)
6. Days We’ll Remember (3:54)
7. Words of Love Evermore (8:41)
The album is available digitally, on CD, and on vinyl. Check out www.psanimals1.com for more information.
For my entire interview with John Boegehold, check out the video below or download/stream Episode 141 of the Michael’s Record Collection podcast. In addition to the new album, John spoke about his musical background and influences, how he got involved with Spock’s Beard, his approach to music writing, lyrics, and album sequencing, and more.
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