Last year, Blur guitarist Graham Coxon and former Pipettes member Rose Elinor Dougall (partners in music and life) released their eponymous record as The WAEVE, a collaboration rooted in instrumental exploration, no-wave melody and esoteric sounds. There was jazz sax, post-punk synth and a medieval lute. There were songs about ancient tides, waking dreams and static magic nights. One year later, The WAEVE return with City Lights.

Where their debut album began with soft piano, City Lights bursts into action with driving beats and howlin’ riffs. “Now your soul belongs to me/It’ll be alright“, Graham sings in the opening line of the album’s title track – have it, we’re sold. We’re out of the rural, open skies now and instead, skyscrapers tower over us and neon lights lead the way as we twist through the city and out the other side; swerving from the Gary Numan-esque Moth To The Flame to Duantia with its bursts of James Chance sax, and into the final track, Sunrise, a sweeping, anthemic score that sounds like euphoria. What begins with a noir pulse evolves into a new dawn. Marking the album release, Graham and Rose took turns taking us through five inspirations that guided their new record.

Graham’s pick
Album
The Court of the Crimson King by King Crimson

“This album will always be influential. It has been since I first listened to it when I was about sixteen at secondary school and it had a huge impact on me. It was recorded in 1969, and for that year it sounds unlike anything else, it’s a very contrary album. It’s covered in the insane guitar playing of Robert Fripp, as well as the amazing drumming of Bill Bruford, one of my favourite drummers. It goes from beautiful and improvised to 21^st Century Schizoid Man, a track which people may be familiar with from various TV adverts; and from quite jarring sounding to complicated math-rock. Some of the production techniques I discovered on the album I use with my band The WAEVE, such as a raking on acoustic guitar with the reverb shooting over into the other speaker… I do that quite a lot and that’s a trick that comes from this album!”

Graham’s pick
Artwork
The Birthday by Marc Chagall, 1915

“When I was at secondary school, the art room was one of my favourite places to be. My art teacher Nick Knight had a poster on the door for a Marc Chagall exhibition which featured a painting called The Birthday. I was absolutely fascinated by it.

The painting features Chagall’s wife Bella at her dressing table and he is floating above her with his neck twisted around to kiss her on the mouth. I’d never seen anything like it. I was about fifteen and I thought, someone is painting sort of like how I imagine stuff! It led me to understand that while I could continue to paint from life, I could also paint from my imagination, so that’s what I started to do. That painting absolutely set me on my journey to art school, and all the rest.”

Graham’s pick
Film
Meantime by Mike Leigh and produced by Central Television for Channel 4, 1983. Starring Tim Roth, Phil Daniels and Gary Oldman.

“This is a film from the early 80s directed by Mike Leigh featuring very early-career Gary Oldman, Tim Roth and Phil Daniels. The film was actually the inspiration behind the video for the Blur song Sunday, Sunday.

It’s about a working-class family who live in a high-rise council block somewhere in E2. Gary Oldman plays a skinhead called Coxy who’s a livewire, very unpredictable. Tim Roth and Phil Daniels are brothers and it captures a period in time, it follows them and their extended family who are a bit more well-to-do. There are lots of dramas, the washing machine door won’t open… Apart from Withnail and I, I think it’s probably the most quotable film ever. There’s loads of amazing pub scenes. There’s a scene with Phil Daniels where he’s in a bedroom with his brother, he takes a packet of fags and says “Oh great, one for me and one for Ron, later on.”

I’ve talked to Phil Daniels about this film and he was originally only given one line, the rest of it was all improvisation. All of these young actors are improvising throughout. It’s absolutely genius.”

Rose’s pick
Book
The Waves by Virginia Woolf, 1931

“A book that had a big influence on me as a young person was (appropriately) The Waves by Virginia Woolf. I had never read prose like it before, that deconstructed traditional syntax structures and narrative to create this painterly abstract experience for the reader which washed over me in such a lyrical way. It made me realise the power of playing with form and her words are so lyrical, but always with her trademark insight into the human condition.”

Rose’s pick
Place
Hampstead Heath

“I’ve chosen Hampstead Heath. I’ve been going there since before I could walk and my dad grew up nearby so I’ve always felt a connection with it. Graham and I had our first proper conversation about music on a socially distanced walk at the start of 2021, which proved to be quite auspicious, and we’ve continued to plot a lot of our musical moves there on walks ever since. We now take our daughter Eliza there a couple of times a week at least and it’s become a real refuge and a chance to get amongst the trees. “

The WAEVE’s new record City Lights is out now.
The duo play London’s Village Underground on 29th October.