10 Shoegazing Epics You May Not Have Heard

4. Engineers €“ Emergency Room

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmfaKzIC2MQ Along with Amusement Parks on Fire, Engineers were amongst the bands unfortunate enough to be dubbed €œnu-gaze€ by the NME in about 2004. The name, thankfully, never stuck. I'm less grateful, though, that the scene, contrived as it was, never really took off. The music was beautiful; and it's all held remarkably well. Emergency Room is from their second album, 2009's Three Fact Fader. It contains all the beloved hallmarks of the shoegaze sound €“ the chugging guitars, the breathy vocals €“ but adds a relentlessly frantic pace and widescreen cinematic orchestration to paint an indelibly clear picture. I see an ambulance furiously speeding its way down a neon motorway in the rain, sirens blazing, desperate to save the waning life strapped within. It ends with soaking Purple Rain strings as the picture slowly fades to black. As for Engineers, they continue to record and, at time of writing, count Germanic synth genius Ulrich Schnauss amongst their ranks €“ whose work, incidentally, is essential listening for anyone interested in the electronic end of the shoegaze pool. Further Listening €“ One In Seven (Engineers, 2005)