Ricky Barson has been at this since 2002, moving through name changes, lineup shifts, and the kind of slow grind that most acts quietly abandon somewhere around year five. What he couldn’t have prepared for was losing Dom Slone, his lead singer, songwriting partner, and by most accounts the other half of what made Educatable tick. That’s not a setback you strategise your way out of. That’s something you either survive or you don’t.
He survived. And then he picked up a guitar.
“Thank You” arrives as the latest chapter in that reinvention, and it arrives with considerably more momentum than you might expect from a project still finding its footing after grief. The track is lively in a way that feels earned rather than performed. There’s a buoyancy to it that nods clearly toward Coldplay and U2 in its more expansive moments, while the rhythm section pulls in something closer to Vampire Weekend, loose and bouncing and modern. Touches of African and world music surface throughout, giving the track a texture that stops it from sitting too comfortably in any single lane.
What Barson seems to understand is that feel-good doesn’t mean shallow. The melodic instincts here are sharp, the kind that lodge somewhere in your head without you noticing until you’re humming it two days later. It’s summer music, yes, but it has enough going on underneath to hold up past August.
The live show is apparently where all of this fully clicks into place. Reports of sold out theatres and venues across the country suggest the Educatable Army, as the fanbase has taken to calling itself, is less a cult following and more a genuine groundswell. Barson has apparently found a way to make a room feel like everyone’s in on something together, which is rarer than it sounds.
Photo Credit: Educatable.