Weirdly, I have had little exposure to I was a King even though they seem to have been around forever (20 years as it happens) and while I was conversant a few years ago with the impressively crafted work from one of the band’s members, Anne Lise Frøkedal and her ‘Familien’, but then I even lost track of her for a while.
So it’s good to catch up with them now as they release this teaser for a retrospective compilation album ‘Best Wishes – A shortcut to I was a King’, which drops on 7th March via Hype City Music.
They’ve worked with numerous names over the years including Norman Blake (Teenage Fanclub), who produced this track ‘Lighthouse’, who both sang and played guitar on it, andwhich again sees the light of day now with the bonus of a previously unreleased video.
Knowing, as I say, a little about Frøkedal, who appears here with her trademark gold Telecaster, I was expecting ‘Lighthouse’ to be laid back but this is something else.
If I’m right the band emanates from the weather beaten west coast of Norway but this could be the West Coast of the USA in the late 1960s, something you’d listen to while sat under a palm tree around an ad hoc campfire on Laguna Beach sipping slowly on your Martini and looking out to the lighthouse on Santa Catalina island as the Counterculture days slipped away and the stark realities of the 1970s beckoned.
It even starts with a little ‘hhh’ as if draw was being exhaled.
And that guitar bridge is so elegant, perfectly in keeping with the effortless harmonies.
It’s so cool you’ll reach for your sweater.
Could it be a bit longer than two minutes and seven seconds? Yes, but the best things always come in small packages as my psychiatrist keeps telling me.
I hear that I was a King are coming to the UK soon to commence the final sessions of recording a new album. Let’s hope they play a few gigs along the way.
Find them on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/iwasaking
Bandcamp (with album pre-order facility): https://iwak.bandcamp.com/album/best-wishes-a-shortcut-to-i-was-a-king
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iwasakingband/
