Dry the River and the magic of live shows

The one breakup I will never recover from.

I was trying to think of a reason to include this band in one of my newsletter series, but then I remembered this is my account, and I don’t need a reason. I can just write about them!

So, consider this my love letter to: Dry the River.

The British band, consisting of Peter Liddle (lead vocals, guitar), Scott Miller (bass), Matt Taylor (guitar), and Jon Warren (drums), released their debut EP, Weights & Measures, in 2011. This was before streaming existed for me in Germany, and I discovered most music by browsing through YouTube. I’m pretty sure it was this video they recorded on a boat in the Amsterdam canals that made me stop and listen to them in the first place:

I was stunned by Liddle’s voice and the band’s harmonies. I couldn’t compare them to any other band, still can’t. People say Mumford & Sons or Fleet Foxes, and I get that. Babel and Helplessness Blues came out around that time, too, but Dry the River still stood out to me with their unique, monumental sound.

By the time their debut album, Shallow Bed, was released in March 2012, they had already played Glastonbury, Great Escape, Reading, and Leeds. The album was produced by Peter Katis, who also worked on Sharon Van Etten's Tramp, which came out the same year.

This album is my Roman Empire.

Shallow Bed has no skips. With every new listen, you discover nuances you haven’t heard before. The lyrics are laden with religious and mythological references and philosophical musings (Peter Liddle studied Medicine and Anthropology, Matt Taylor Theology). It’s the intense imagery combined with the grand production of songs like Weights and Measures that put Dry the River, and especially this album, on a pedestal of its own.

You've made your decision
Now get up and leave
The familiar sting of the woodcutter's swing to the tree

I'll fall in the forest
To elbows and knees
And it won't make a sound
Since there's no-one around here to see

-Weights & Measures

Each track is a journey. You don’t just listen to Shallow Bed; you experience it.

I had the chance to interview Dry the River for my old music blog when they played at Knust in Hamburg on a cold Winter day in November 2012. After doing some digging, I found the interview in the web archive—a discovery that’s both nostalgic and humbling. In our conversation, they talked about how At The Drive-In influenced their approach to live performances, shaping their vision for what they wanted their shows to be like. They also shared how proud they were to headline Shepherd's Bush Empire, their biggest show at the time. I think my love for the band stems from the fact that I’ve always considered them a live band first and a recording artist second. In the era of music streaming and the wake of the pandemic, I think we’ve sometimes lost sight of just how magical great live shows can be. That’s the reason why I’m so enamored with bands like The Joy Hotel or The Last Dinner Party, too (coincidentally, they all happen to be British). Live shows create a shared experience that’s tangible in a world where listening to music has become detached and solitary. That’s why the comparison to Mumford & Sons and Fleet Foxes doesn’t seem so far-fetched after all. It’s less about the similarity in their music and more about the exceptional quality of their live performances.

In 2014, Dry the River released their sophomore album, Alarms in the Heart, which leaned towards a more mainstream sound. That same year, I had the chance to see them live again at the Reeperbahn Festival.

In an interview in July 2015, they talked about releasing album three but announced their breakup in November of the same year. With the announcement came the release of their final EP, Hooves of Doubt. While I wasn’t the biggest fan of Alarms in the Heart, the EP felt like a return to the style of Shallow Bed, and the breakup hit hard.

Almost 10 years later, I still find myself returning to Dry the River every few months, falling in love with their music all over again, and missing them like hell.