This Picture

In 1991 the British ensemble This Picture surfaced on U.S. modern rock stations through “Naked Rain,” sparking a flood of phone requests from listeners who assumed they were hearing the newest U2 single. Alongside Tuesday Blue and Cactus World News, the quartet chased the same panoramic style associated with the Irish supergroup. The timing proved unfortunate: U2 issued Achtung Baby precisely while “Naked Rain” ascended the alternative charts, erasing any appetite for further replicas of that sound. Even so, the song’s poetic words and insistent melodies supplied modern rock radio with one final surge of ’80s new wave–inflected guitar pop moments before Nirvana and the Seattle brigade steered the format toward louder, distorted textures. Formed in Bath, England, the lineup featured Symon Bye on vocals, Robert Forrester on guitar, Austen Rowley on bass, and Duncan Forrester on drums. Their debut album, A Violent Impression, arrived the same year. Although “Naked Rain” thrived on alternative playlists, it never registered on mainstream charts. By the period when the follow-up track “Breathe Deeply Now” reached modern rock programmers, grunge already saturated the airwaves. A Violent Impression consequently landed in cutout bins, and stations removed This Picture once early-’90s programmers shifted focus toward younger audiences. The band completed a second album, City of Sin, in 1994 before fading from view.