After over twenty years, ten Athlone is back with a new album, a film-single and much more to come.
March 2020 was on course to be a busy month, and the start of a busy year for Joe Vaz, former band-member and co-songwriter of ten Athlone. He was working on a BBC America TV series, and about to head into several weeks of rehearsals in Manilla for School of Rock: The Musical, a touring show which would take him around China and Asia for the next year-and-a-half.
Unfortunately, as I’m sure we all remember, a spanner was gleefully thrown in the works and the world was forced to slow down to a halt. And thus, for the most part, ended 2020 in March.
Within the space of 24 hours Joe’s employment prospects for the next year-and-a-half dried up and vanished. What followed, I’m sure, is mirrored in so many other people’s lives over this time. A family member was lost, work disappeared, finances evaporated and alternative plans had to be made.
After 16 years living in an apartment in the centre of Cape Town, the choice was made to move down to the deep south of the peninsula to save money.
Upon moving in, Joe converted the disused toolshed into a makeshift voice-over studio in the hope of getting some work through the lockdowns. He didn’t find any work, but what he did find was old boxes of sound equipment, mics and guitars. Joe was suddenly sitting with an awful lot of time on his hands, and a recording studio in his back yard. It wasn’t pretty, but it did the job, and for the first time in nearly twenty years, Joe started writing music again.
At first it was just for fun, something to keep his brain active and creativity flowing through the lockdowns, but Joe quickly found himself sitting on half-a-dozen new songs and the idea of bringing ten Athlone back to life began to rear up in his head.
Nearly four years later, and ten Athlone is back with a bang with their first full-length album in 24 years.
Travelator is a ten-track album that ebbs and flows very much like Joe’s temperament over that initial period of lockdown, with slow ballads and kick-ass funky beats living side-by-side with retro-eighties-electro-pop.
