ON THE RISE
Some people will pursue spiritual enlightenment without ever being able to achieve it, much like a drug and trying to reach an unattainable high. This is the theme of the brand new single called “Chasing Dragons,” off of Wesley Adams Cook’s second EP titled Chasing Dragons.
“The song is about chasing spiritual experiences, but not integrating them,” says Cook, who is a singer, songwriter, guitarist and composer from Colorado.
Cook is a writer at heart and derives his inspiration from all kinds of avenues. In the case of “Chasing Dragons,” he was reading a book about the American bombers in World War II called “The Wild Blue.”
“I had the idea from that book for a lot of the imagery of these flying B24s, and the thought of chasing something you can never quite get to,” Cook explains.
The song has an intense vibe from the start, with a slow and steady drum beat along with a smooth, almost ominous, tone. Cook’s vocals then drop in, using vivid imagery of military history to accompany his theme. The track is catchy and thought-provoking, while using tempo changes and a solid chorus to help set the mood. Cook also finds the beat playful, adding a dynamic layer that contrasts with the darker tones and gives the song an unexpected energy.
“You’re in my headlights
But just too fast for me
Oh your golden
Treasure stolen
Got me smoking
Jet fuel when I’m lagging
Just trying to catch a dragon
I can’t reach.”
Cook’s musical journey has been a “natural unfolding,” and he has always had a knack for writing. He grew up listening to all kinds of music, ranging from oldies, to rock and R&B, to classical music and musicals. Cook is heavily inspired by his musical roots, citing artists like Sting, Elton John, Muse and The Doors as driving forces.
Cook reminisces about his first EP, titled Caught In The Middle, which he notes is a little more traditional than his most recent work. He recalls spending about 10 months car camping in Sedona, Arizona, and one morning he woke up and his intuitive nature kicked in. He knew he needed to start releasing music of his own.
Cook contacted producer Kael Alden, who pointed him toward a studio to record near Fort Collins, as well as another producer for the debut EP.
When it came to recording Chasing Dragons, brand new inspirations suddenly came over Cook about the direction he wanted to take. Cook had Alden take the lead on producing the six track EP, and he is very pleased with the finished product
“It was so different from how I made the first one,” Cook explains. “With my first EP, going in I was just like, here’s my guitar and vocals, we’ll get a drummer, and some bass. With this one, I just started to have ideas with other different styles of music. It was different than what I was expecting, but something about it feels good to me.”
Cook says his creative process can be all over the map, and it is all speculation about where his ideas may come from.
“Is it from a kind of force or energy?” Cook says. “Sometimes it is almost like a collaborative dance where I get little bread crumbs that are like, ‘here’s an idea.’ I just kind of play with it, and you never know where it could go. I like to learn a lot and I find that helps open the doors to a lot.”
It is tough to narrow down a specific genre or style for Cook’s music, but one aspect that is ever-present is his ability to utilize metaphors and imagery in his material.
“I write songs, and it’s always been something I have an affinity for,” Cook says. “I kept doing it and life kept opening up doors for me to continue to pursue it. I had people who just encouraged me along the way.”
He adds, “I found my niche of writing songs way back in elementary school, but I got more into it in high school when I learned to play the guitar. It allowed me to formulate musical composition with my writing.”
There was a time when Cook simply wanted to be a lyricist and a singer, but when he searched for musicians to join him, they didn’t play anything that even resembled what he wants to play. Everything changed after a trip to Europe where he heard the band Muse for the first time, and he had a wave of inspiration.
“I had a very sincere prayer, took a trip to Spain, and went on a trip to England with my cousin where I heard Muse,” Cook explains. “That definitely inspired me to get back into guitar, and allowed me to then create songs and formulate them the way I liked.”
Cook has more than 80 songs that are just waiting to be recorded. He is a writing machine, and is always working on something new.
“I wrote a new song just last week, and this past month probably three more,” Cook says. “That creative valve just doesn’t stop, especially if you’re using it.”
Be sure to keep up with all that is going on in Cook’s musical world, including his new EP Chasing Dragons, available on all platforms on December 6th.
ON THE RISE
As Belle & Sebastian share their buoyant 2026 Scotland World Cup anthem ‘It Only Takes One Lion’, frontman Stuart Murdoch has spoken to NME about capturing the feeling back home and his hopes for the team since childhood.
Released today (Tuesday June 2), the Scottish indie heroes’ bid for their nation’s tournament anthem was written after the team’s surprise 4-2 qualifying win against Denmark.
“I felt like we were watching history in the moment, like the hand of God from the old National Lottery adverts was pointing at us,” Murdoch told NME about that game-changing victory. “It was meant to be. Scotland aren’t a terrific team and Denmark are better, but it just felt that day that Scotland were destined to win. Three out of the four goals were things of beauty.”
Produced by and co-written with Pete Ferguson and premiered at the band’s recent London Royal Albert Hall show as part of the anniversary tour for their classic first two albums ‘Tigermilk’ and ‘If You’re Feeling Sinister’, the soaring song is intrinsically Belle & Sebastian as it morphs from a hymn to a an orchestral disco jam as Murdoch sings of a nation’s hopes and his own boyhood dreams.
NME spoke to Murdoch from the band’s North American tour, where we found him in a graveyard in Texas. “I was just looking for a park because Austin is a pretty scary place downtown now, so I’ve ended up in the Texas Cemetery,” he shared via Zoom.
Was there anyone famous buried there?
“I was looking around and I found the founder of Austin City Limits, which is pretty cool as that’s where we’re playing tonight. I’m looking at one now and it just says, ‘Martin: he loved the law’. Then underneath it says, ‘Billie Louise: she loved the lawyer’.”
We joke that there’s the opening to a Belle & Sebastian song if there ever there was one. “It’s great! It’s given me inspiration.”
For now, read the rest of interview with Murdoch below as he tells us about Scotland’s chances, 30 years of hurt, if fans will be singing it at the top of their lungs in Canada, the US and Mexico this summer, and what’s next for the band.
NME: Hello Stuart. Here we are with ‘It Only Takes One Lion’ Who needs three?
Stuart Murdoch: “Who needs three? Good question. I wouldn’t know!”
What’s the mood been like in Scotland since you qualified?
“It’s funny. I’ve noticed this everywhere: with the World Cup there’s a mixture of cynicism and anticipation. When the actual tournament starts, everyone will get excited about it. Because of FIFA, the peace prize, the ticket prices, people seem quite down about it. I found that in Mexico. They were quite fed up with the general hype about it. I’m in the States just now and you shouldn’t believe all the hype: people are people. The States are just as ‘great’ as ever. We love coming here, we love the cities. The general sense of North American optimism will make for a good tournament.”
“With Scotland though, people will definitely be excited about it. You have to understand, it’s been 30 years since Scotland qualified so I think everybody and their dog has written a song for the team.”
How do you meet the challenge of penning a World Cup anthem, when there have been so many legendary bangers and absolutely shite duds?
“I never planned it. I woke up with a tune in my head and a feeling. That’s the way it should always be for songs. I couldn’t control myself and it was quite straight-forward. I wrote this initial bit about how I felt about the current World Cup team and the qualifying game. It was more introspective.
“When it starts off with, ‘The days are dark and long…’, it’s just my general feeling about football. I’ve been going to see my own team quite a lot recently. It’s my little anthem for how I feel about football and following Scotland for the last 50 years, just the ups and downs. It’s quite a heartfelt thing. When I was eight or nine, the Scottish team meant so much to me, it the thing I was most invested in. There’s a line in there about how I used to memorise the whole squad before ‘78 and 82.”
Tell us about lyric: “This is Scotland, where everyone knows you start with nothing… where you can join an army for peace”…
“My wife made the video for it and she said, ‘I’m not sure I like that line about everyone starting with nothing’. Our first game is against Haiti and they really have nothing. Their country is pretty poor and they’re going through hard times. It was almost a throwaway line and I’m not sure what I meant by it, but in a footballing sense every game starts with nothing. Even if it’s against Brazil, you’ve always got a chance!
“The army refers to The Tartan Army, which has really been quite a remarkable institution for the past 30 years. We changed from drunken buffoons that used to wreck things to this excellent supporting brigade.”
It’s not your standard football sing-along. Can you see it being sung in the terraces?
“I’m not sure, I didn’t cynically design it for that. Many people have said to me in the past, ‘None of your songs have a chorus, you need to write one’. ‘This is Scotland’ is a chorus! They things need to happen organically. I’m sure the fans will still be singing ‘Yes sir, I can boogie’ for years to come.”
What do you actually think of Scotland’s chances right now?
“With the last Euros, they maybe got stage fright or didn’t have that tournament experience. I think Andy Robertson [captain] will be telling them, ‘We really need to produce our best stuff’. If they do and we see them actually playing football, then I don’t really care about the results that much. I just want to see Scotland exceeding our expectations of them. That Denmark game was so crazy that everything after just feels like a bonus.”
If miracles do happen and Scotland make it to the final, how will you celebrate? A free gig in Glasgow?
“Of course, yes! Free everything. If we even got close, I think the whole country would shut down for a year and the GDP would drop. We’d go into a massive recession but no one would care.
“We were playing a gig in Mexico City and I told the crowd, ‘It’s you and us, Mexico and Scotland in the final’. Mexico have never really got close either. I told them it would be five goals a piece, even after everyone takes a penalty and we have to share the trophy. I would settle for that.”
You released two albums in quick succession with 2022’s ‘A Bit of Previous’, 2023’s ‘Late Developers’ and then your debut novel Nobody’s Empire in 2024. You’ve been busy! Is there any progress on new material?
“We went through a period where we recorded a lot and we said, ‘Let’s not record for a while and give ourselves a couple of cycles off’. We’re doing these 30th anniversary shows so we’re just going to lean on the back catalogue and cruise for a while. We’re doing a year on and a year off so everyone can focus on different things.
We’re not looking at new Belles stuff for a while. I’m meant to be developing Nobody’s Empire into a film, so that’s my next task. It’s a long way off from being made but I’m going to write the script for that.”
Scotland’s first World Cup tournament match is against Haiti on Sunday June 14, before they go on to play Morocco on Friday June 19 and Brazil on Wednesday June 24.
The band’s ‘Tigermilk’ and ‘If You’re Feeling Sinister’ anniversary tour continues throughout the summer, performing the iconic albums in full during across the UK, Europe, North America, Mexico, Australia, Singapore and Japan. Visit here for tickets and more information.
