Lost Souls (2000)

Lost Souls is the debut studio album by British indie rock band Doves, released by Heavenly Recordings on 3 April 2000. The album was recorded over a period of several years, following the dissolution of Doves' original musical incarnation as house music act Sub Sub. Lost Souls was a moderate chart success in the UK; the album peaked at number 16, while the three singles taken from the album charted in the Top 40.

Lost Souls was considered by many to be the best debut album by a British act since Oasis' Definitely Maybe. It was met with positive critical acclaim and was a shortlist nominee for the Mercury Prize in 2000. The album was roundly praised on its release for its blending of claustrophobic intensity and euphoria, the sonic influences from electronic music present in its textures and for being "the perfect after-hours soundtrack."

Background

In the early 1990s, Jimi Goodwin and twin brothers Jez and Andy Williams were producing dance music as Sub Sub. The trio, along with guest vocalist Melanie Williams, had a club and chart hit single with "Ain't No Love (Ain't No Use)" in 1993, reaching #3 on the UK Singles Chart and becoming one of many dance singles to cross over into mainstream popularity in the UK. The song would remain Sub Sub's only hit single; the release of the sole studio album Full Fathom Five in September 1994 and a handful of singles thereafter struggled to match the single's success.

In February 1996, on the Williams twins' birthday, the band's recording studio located in Ancoats, Manchester caught fire and burned down, destroying virtually all of the band's equipment and recorded material. In an interview with Excellent Online, Jimi Goodwin said of the fire, "Yeah, we lost tapes, we lost equipment. But we were insured. If we weren't insured, we might not be here now. When forty grand goes up, where would we be to get that back at 22 years old? So, yeah, we were lucky. It was a blessing in a way. I was laughing. After the initial shock, I started giggling, y'know? It was like [looking to the sky], 'What else you gonna throw at me, man? C'mon then, fucking bring it on! Me bird just left me, what else you got?'" The only surviving recorded material recovered from the ashes was released as Delta Tapes in February 1998, featuring early versions of later Doves tracks "Firesuite" and "Blue Water", as well as B-side tracks "Crunch" and "Lost in Watts".

Before the fire, however, the band were already looking towards a new musical direction. In a 2009 interview with QTheMusic.com, Andy Williams stated that, "As Sub Sub we never made the album we thought we were all capable of. We'd always been in love with the idea of albums as opposed to just singles – which are cool in their way and suit dance music perfectly but we wanted to stretch ourselves and make a statement with a set of songs. So around 1996 we started writing and recording the songs which would finally become Lost Souls. We were for all intent and purposes still Sub Sub (we only called ourselves Doves a week or two before The Cedar Room was released, because we wanted a fresh start and a break from the past)."

Production

Sub Sub had been signed to Rob's Records, a label owned by Manchester-based manager Rob Gretton. After the studio fire, Gretton suggested that the band rent the studio owned by New Order in Cheetham Hill (VIBE Recording Studios, nicknamed 'Frank Bough Sound II' by the band) for recording. The bulk of what would become Lost Souls was recorded there; said Andy Williams, "We really did lock ourselves away for three to four years until we discovered how we wanted to sound, it was a pretty oppressive place with no windows and thieves trying to break in! But it was also an inspiring place to be as it belonged to New Order and we were fans ... The garage there was full of their old gear; it was full of vintage keyboards, sequencers, drum machines and was like some weird techno graveyard in there. I also remember finding Stephen Morris' Rogers drum kit that he used in Joy Division stuffed behind some knackered flight case."