Jeehye Ham of Precocious Neophyte on the music that made her

Want to know more about the music that made your favorite local artists? Under the Influence explores the inspirations behind music acts across the Front Range, breaking down three albums that left the biggest impression on their own sound. 

For our debut column, Caribou Current caught up with Jeehye Ham of Boulder-based, Korean-born shoegaze act Precocious Neophyte to talk about the music that helped lay the groundwork for her band’s ethereal (and loud) brand of guitar-heavy dream pop. 

Noizegarden - ... But Not Least (1999)

“This was the first cassette of a Korean indie artist I bought. I was in my early 20s. I listened to this album over and over almost everyday on the bus and train in Seoul, and it made me feel like I was not living in the miserable reality of that time. I love the composition, Byeongjoo Yoon’s guitar style and the singer’s beautiful voice. 

The songs are recorded in a minimalist style with not many tracks on each. Every song is dark and sounds like if Soundgarden made an album in a slower, simpler grunge style. The vocalist is quite different from Chris Cornell, which makes the vocals sound even more appealing. I usually do not like music with lots of guitar solos, but all of the guitar parts on this album are great, both solos and riffs. 

After Noizegarden broke up, they did not play again for a long time. I was lucky enough to see them live in Korea when they finally reunited for one show. Not long after that, I heard that the singer, Gunn Park, passed away from cancer.”  

Mogwai - Rock Action (2001)

“When I started playing with a band called Vidulgi OoyoO in Seoul as a college student, we hung out a lot at one of the band member’s places, and he and his roommate played CDs all the time. Rock Action was one of the albums from their collection we listened to often. Recently, I have started listening to Mogwai again. I love Young Team and Come on Die Young, but my all-time favorite is Rock Action.”

Mid-Air Thief - Crumbling (2019) 

“This is my favorite recent album. It always sounds good and it’s never boring. The lyrics are almost devoutly religious. I read an interview with the artist once in which they said they  converted all of the original digital tracks to tape and used the tape tracks in place of the digital tracks entirely to create a more analog sound. 

Crumbling is an album that blends acoustic guitar, synthesizer and samples together startlingly well. It is very easy to listen to, and the more you listen, the more sounds you hear. Mid-Air Thief has never played live, and he continues to release new music under different artist names. I was very happy to find the album at Wax Trax in Denver, which was the first time I went to a record shop after moving to Boulder.”

LISTEN UP: Home in the Desert by Precocious Neophyte is out now via Graveface Records on cassette, LP, digital download and streaming formats.