John Andrew Frederick has been the black watch – existing entirely in lower case – since the late 80s. A polymath and Anglophile based in Los Angeles; at times an author, university lecturer, tennis coach, film critic; who has released way above a score of albums across way longer than 31 Years Of Obscurity – the title of his 2019 best of/greatest hits collection; a scattergun sequence and not a bad place to have hopped onto the black watch bus.

1988 was the year of Blue Bell Knoll and Isn’t Anything; in one strand of the black watch story 80s UK Indie as it pivoted to neo-psychy shoegaze is ground zero. Another origin tale has Frederick bed-bound with a broken leg where he read voraciously and listened to The White Album on repeat. What is safe to say is he has his talismans and they serve him well; to an extent black watch albums are always reassertions but equally they’re always variants and that variety keeps his listeners sharp.

Since 31 Years Of Obscurity the releases have come thick and fast while he’s gathered a cohort of sympathetic and trustworthy musicians around him. He brings them songs and lets them get on with it which often entails unexpected twists and turns. The current cohort includes his son Chandler, Rob Campanella (The Tyde, The Quarter After), Andy Creighton (The Parson Red Heads), and Misha Bullock (The Stevenson Ranch Davidians). The latter trio have all taken production roles on recent records, and there’s a sense now of instinct and telepathy at work.

Varied Superstitions is very well positioned to heighten the black watch’s profile. The Gary Unwin/Nick Saloman-helmed Blue Matter imprint is in itself a marker of quality, and twelve tracks coming in at a little over the fifty minutes mark makes a prime length for both double vinyl or single CD. On top of which across the spectrum all the wares are on display; the diverse facets all marshalled and just awaiting attentive, patient listeners.

Frederick is forever nervous of saying something definitive so there’s an obliqueness about his lyrics even when they appear straightforward, and sonically too it takes a little time for the picture to form. The opener ‘It Is What It Isn’t’ may be an assault on trite, though a line like “In a day when hoping is only a mere memory” is one of a few here that could well refer to contemporary matters.

The longest track of the sequence, it’s a droney racer where every so often a subdued jangle looks to make an escape, while the voice sits slightly beneath as it will on many tracks. The lyric is done halfway through, then an unexpected little bridge leads to an extended outro somewhere between My Bloody Valentine and Teenage Fanclub. The title track follows chiming with everyone getting their head while Frederick runs through a parade of irrationalities, and we’re away.

‘Living Backwards’ is light and meditative; “we never lose what we even chose… even in dreams and the unseen the whole of you is there”. ‘Precious Little’ finds The Pixies meeting New Order though like many of his songs it reserves the right to go somewhere else and towards its ending it does. ‘Sorry Wounds’ picks up its predecessor’s baton but with hubbub and noise and a sense of the hinges coming off while ‘Jolly Melancholy’ employs electronica against a heart-felt delivery and surprisingly lingering end.

‘Faze’ brings a smart title,and sonic adventures with a whiff of the psychedelic Beatles who remain rather more unnervingly for ‘No I Shouldn’t’ with its washes and reverses serving as something of a palate cleanser. After this pair ‘Some People Will Believe’ is busy but relatively more akin to someone like Vetiver; “some people will believe almost anything these days/some people will believe almost anyone these days”

With its suggestion of some valeted orgy ‘Your Clothes Sir’ appears as the erotic absurd, surprising with exotic percussion, measured guitar, and clear vocals. The hint of a Cocteaus patina, and possibly a tender twist as “clothes sir” morphs into “closer”. Contrastingly the busy fogged fuzz of ‘In This Town’ contrives to be both brief and overstay before the stately shudder of ‘Pretending’ with its final benediction “the old mistakes, just different days that’s the way it only goes.”

In totality Varied Superstitions provides a comprehensive panorama of the black watch; a stand-out collection growing in stature over repeated hearings, in its admixture of puzzle and thrill, chime and fuzz, eliciting engagement. Plus with a fair wind concurrently kicking down the doors to a seriously significant back-catalogue.

Varied Superstitions is available now via Blue Matter Records. Also via the black watch’s Bandcamp along with much else.