Quiet Wish

Quiet Wish

Quiet Wish are a group from Surrey, active since 2014. The project is made up of Carola Baer and David J Lambert, two singer-songwriters and musicians who work together on original material.

Style and influences

Their music is difficult to place in one genre, but it draws on Mazzy Star and Cocteau Twins, and has been compared with an acoustic, relaxed Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks combination before Fleetwood Mac. Their songs often come from ideas about the world people live in, with an emphasis on environmental awareness and on changing society for the better. Carola Baer’s voice is described in the material as sometimes bluesy and sometimes mellow, with comparisons to Stevie Nicks and, at times, Kate Bush. David Lambert contributes detailed guitar parts, often on a nylon-strung electric guitar synthesizer, and his lower voice blends with Carola’s.

Formation and recordings

The group forms in September 2014 in Surrey, England. Soon after forming, Carola Baer and David Lambert begin recording original songs in a raw acoustic style, which leads to their first CD, Change. They continue writing together and work on a second CD, which includes both more plugged-in tracks and songs that remain in the acoustic vein.

Carola Baer

Carola Baer grows up in West London and later moves to the United States in her early twenties. She settles in San Francisco, where Ian Butler encourages her to start composing piano-based material. She then spends four years working with Mike Freeman on politically based industrial sounds and multimedia performances. Baer also experiments with vocal free-form improvisation, using ethnic melodies, wordless vocalisations and spoken sounds in the style of Cocteau Twins and Dead Can Dance. In the late 1990s she forms Flowers for Delia with bassist Steve Brown and guitarist Tim Foley and performs in small venues around San Francisco. After moving to Seattle in 2007, she works with David Rispoli and makes a full CD before returning to the UK. Her writing with Quiet Wish reflects humanitarian and environmental concerns, and she speaks out against injustice through her music. She is the granddaughter of Rupen Metrobian, the sole survivor of his family after the 1915 Armenian genocide.

David J Lambert

David J Lambert is brought up in Dagenham in east London and begins playing guitar at 11. As a teenager, he develops an interest in recording through sound-on-sound techniques using reel-to-reel and cassette recorders, and later borrows an early drum machine from designer Peter Kershaw. He plays in jam bands, performs Steely Dan covers at Leeds University, and later appears regularly in local folk clubs, especially The Anchor in Byfleet, Surrey. He is also involved in a blues collective at Bracknell’s South Hill Park Arts Centre, where he pushes for a mix of folk and rock. In 2009 he joins the early line-up of pagan-folk-rock band Spriggan Mist with Baz and Maxine Cilia, Andy Wilkin and his wife Gill. He records and produces their first album, Caught In A Spell, and writes two songs for it. With Spriggan Mist he performs at the 3 Wishes Faery Festival three times, at a rally for more than 500 Buddhists, and on BBC Radio through BBC Introducing. Before meeting Carola Baer, he writes songs in a cynical, protest-oriented style and also free-jams in a progressive style with guitarist Pete Slade and drummer Shaun Finch of the Bounty Hounds.

Lyrics and outlook

Quiet Wish take their name from the group’s reflective and restrained approach. Some songs are suited to quieter late-evening listening, while others shift in mood. Carola Baer’s lyrics often seem personal but are frequently about the relationship between people and the planet, while David Lambert’s writing is more direct and also addresses war and political issues.