Tingles Explained

Tingles
Type:EP
Artist:Ratcat
Cover:Tingles EP by Ratcat.jpg
Label:rooArt
Producer:Nick Mainsbridge
Prev Title:This Nightmare
Prev Year:1989
Next Title:Blind Love
Next Year:1991

Tingles is an extended play (EP) by Australian indie pop band Ratcat, released on 1 October 1990.It went on to peak at No.1 in Australia and finished 1991 as the second best-selling single of the year, behind "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" by Bryan Adams.[1] It was also the highest-selling single in Australia by an Australian artist in 1991. The EP was promoted by the song "That Ain't Bad", which charted on the US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart, peaking at number 27 in November 1991.

Reception

Tingles was given 4.5 out of 5 in a review by All Music.[2]

Steve Gardner from NKVD Records said "I'm really surprised they could chart with a guitar sound this gnarly; the songs are obvious radio pop stuff, but songs made for radio don't have guitars mixed as loud as the vocals and they certainly don't have the distortion set to 10." adding "All of the first side is excellent, and "Skin" from the second side is equally good. "Away from This World" sounds cool on first listen as the music is married with the soundtrack from the Challenger space shuttle explosion, but it doesn't hold up to repeated play and "My Bloody Valentine" is a throwaway experiment that fizzled out. Still, a pleasant surprise and show of potential for good things still to come."[3]

In The Sell-In, Craig Mathieson said, "Day had written "That Aint Bad" in a simple attempt to mix noisy guitars and the words 'I love you' together in a song. He though it was funny, coming from the thrash-punk scene. The result was undeniably catchy."[4] Junkee described "That Aint Bad" as, "buzzy and ever-so-slightly painful: It’s an ode buried amongst an entire broken speaker’s worth of feedback that eventually descends into a series of scream-sung promises. Blast it outside the house of your beloved through a cassette player held aloft over your head."[5]

Charts

Year-end charts

Release history

RegionDateFormatLabel
Australia1 October 1990CDrooArt[7]
United Kingdom15 July 1991Mini-album[8]

See also

List of number-one singles in Australia during the 1990s

Notes and References

  1. Web site: ARIA Top 50 Singles for 1991. ARIA. 6 June 2021.
  2. Web site: Ratcat – Tingles. AllMusic. 12 March 2015.
  3. Web site: Album and Single Reviews. Ratcat Reviews. 2 July 2018.
  4. Book: Mathieson, Craig . Craig Mathieson

    . The Sell-in: How the Music Business Seduced Alternative Rock. Craig Mathieson . . 2000 . 51. 1-86508-412-3.

  5. Web site: Junkee . The 200 Greatest Australian Songs Of All Time, Part One. Joseph Earp.
  6. Alternative Airplay. Billboard. 2 November 1991. subscription. 18 August 2023.
  7. Web site: New Release Summary – Product Available from: 01/10/90 > Singles (from The ARIA Report Issue No. 38). ARIA. Imgur. 18 May 2016.
  8. New Releases: Albums. Music Week. 10. 13 July 1991.