Holy Pinto is a band that has survived through moving across countries, growing up and narrating songs with vivd story lines. This style of song writing continues with the newest release, Tales From The Travelling T-Shirt Salmesman. Led by Aymen Saleh, there’s nothing short of color that dashes through this five song release, grinding through aspects of storytelling that bring out a sense of nostalgia and the typical impatience of life. “Salt” has a windeing vocal line that dances with the melodies, grasping the listener with a memorable presence. “Very Adult” is a quick dash of wonderful dynamics.
New Noise Magazine is pleased to be bringing forth this in depth track by track of Tales From The Travelling Salesman by Holy Pinto, as written by songwriter Aymen Saleh.
Gold Leaf – The song “Gold Leaf” is about distance, the restless feeling of wanting to ramble, of being wide-eyed about the world and wanting to chase experience. The song is tinged with sadness and regret; about what you sometimes give up, the potential of letting someone down and leaving them behind whilst following your internal compass and indulging your inner-restlessness. It’s also about smoking addiction!
The chorus came into my head whilst I was in the shower, which is the only time that’s ever happened! I wasn’t sure whether I even liked the idea, so I didn’t use it for a year, but the chorus kept popping up in my head consistently over the next year so I gave in to it and finished the song. I felt the verses could be smoother and softer than the spiky riff that goes throughout them, so we worked in a latin groove and baseline which is really fun.
Salt – It’s a nostalgic song about old friends and growing apart. Harkening back to and remembering fondly the so-called “Glory days” when we were young and carefree. Sometimes your friends don’t stay with you forever; or maybe you don’t stay with them forever. Either way, it’s a lighthearted look back at old friendships; moreover, the sadness of loss and picking up the pieces after the dissolution of a friendship. It’s got a lot of silly light-hearted lines in there and the song doesn’t take itself too seriously.
Bitter Enemies – I was listening to a lot of old Italian pop songs at the time and wanted to write a musically warm-sounding song, as vague as that sounds! I always wanted to put a cumbia groove in a song and so built this song off that.
This is a song about fears and their ownership over you. It speaks to how fearful thoughts can become cyclical. It creates a casual and loose dichotomy of there being positive and negative thoughts and personality traits; your inner-friend and your inner-enemy. I feel like it starts friendly and then ends fierce.
Very Adult – It’s a playful song about growing up. It expresses the restlessness and uncertainty that certain life-choices create, and the attempt to conjure up a message of self-belief to get you through those feelings. It’s about channeling that coming-of-age anxiety into excitement and positivity rather than fear and hurt. It’s, personally for me, about making the lifestyle choice to try and aspire to be a full-time musician, and the repercussions of that. It’s about trying to get over the daily self-doubt that comes with that by trying to muster courage and embrace a carpe diem (seize the day) mentality.
Ryan goes crazy on the drums on this one, I kinda feel like it’s a cool drum solo while I try hold it all together, haha.
King – King is a fight song – a story of a defiant fight against an authority figure. It’s told in the form of ‘a day in the life’ and follows the narrator’s activities that day, all the while expressing a refusal to let the authoritative figure shackle his freedom. It has the person battling against his own internal hopelessness, sadness, self-doubt and regret, but somehow retaining the resilience and self-assuredness to keep fighting his corner without crumbling.
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