The Light and Dark of The Apartments

By Henry Lipput

It’s hard to imagine someone in their twenties writing an album of songs like the ones on The Apartments’ In and Out of the Light (Riley Records/Talitres). Peter Milton Walsh has been part of the music scene in Australia since 1978 and the sad and beautiful new album is full of songs of regret, encouragement, and even anger that reflect experienced life (and love) lessons. And whether In and Out of the Light is a concept album about one relationship or a collection of songs about the many over the years that didn’t work out, it illustrates how there’s something worse than the hurt of a breakup: it’s the post-breakup that you have to live with.

The album was a global effort with Walsh and bass player Eliot Fish working with producer Tim Kevin in Sydney, French Apartments Natasha Penot and Antoine Chaperon recording their parts in various studios in France, English drummer Nick Allum working in London, and Chris Abrahams from Australia’s The Necks on piano. 

“Pocketful of Sunshine” is the story of a mismatched relationship: “You were a running spring of fresh hopes/You had your pockets full of sunshine/I had my hands full of rain,” Walsh sings, taking the blame and acknowledging “Some fall in love/Some fall in loneliness.”

In “Write Your Way Out Of Town” he encourages a former lover to move on by using her creativity:  “Whatever it was that went wrong/She poured it into song/Whatever it was that went wrong/Write your way of town/Write your way out of sorrow.” And he’s hoping that this might be a way to bring them together again: “Could you write your way back to me some day?”

Former relationships and the continuing emotional ties are also the subject of “Where You Used To Be” (“There’s a whole in the world where you used to be”) and he takes the blame again on “Butterfly Kisses:” You saved my life with a butterfly kiss/So many troubles I just couldn’t fix/I went singing through the Summer/Then the Winter set in.”

On “I Don’t Give A Fuck About You Anymore” Walsh’s narrator fools himself into believing that he’s moved on and doesn’t care at all about this former lover: “I like living without you/Can’t you see I’m getting by?/Except when I’m dreaming or drinking/Breathing or sleeping/Walking or talking/I don’t give a fuck about you anymore.”

Next time: Triple Play #3 (still more from 2020)