‘I Should Be Happy’ Album Underscores Singer’s Perseverance
By DONNA BALANCIA
Anne Richmond Boston has released “I Should Be Happy” and she and listeners are truly happy as this excellent album has finally gotten a release after some 30 years.
“I was lucky enough to have some people help me out and get the old tapes digitized and then I was able to take it back in the studio and have it remixed and mastered, and now it’s out,” she said.
It was a labor of love for Richmond Boston, known to new wave fans as a member of The Swimming Pool Qs.
And while Richmond Boston had done another solo album before, “The Big House of Time,” the would-be follow up, “I Should Be Happy” always had a special place in her heart. And for reasons still unknown to her, the album never made it to listeners’ ears.
“I had done a solo album and that came out after I had left the Swimming Pool Qs,” she said. “And my husband at the time, Rob Gal, produced and engineered and played guitar on it and wrote a lot of the songs on the record and we put it out on DB Records, which is an Atlanta label that put out a lot of music back in the ’80s and ’90s.
“‘The Big House of Time’ did pretty well,” she said. “I mean, it got some great reviews and we played a few shows and all that. And then we decided we’d do a follow-up. We had it ready, we finished the recording and then mixed it and well, Rob did, and I never really knew what the story was, what exactly what happened, but it just got shelved and it just never came out.
“It made me mad, I was sad and Rob and I at this exact time, were going through a separation and divorce, and I was moving from Atlanta to Athens and getting a new job,” she said. “And my father had just died. I mean, all this stuff had just happened.
“And then a few years ago this other friend of mine, Clay Harper, who is a pizza magnate in Atlanta — he owns this pizza place called Fellini’s Pizza; he wrote, ‘I Should Be Happy’ — he would bring it up every once in a while and he said, ‘Listen, why don’t we get the tape?’
“I have the tapes because Rob’s studio had closed, and he gave me the tapes when that happened, and so I had them just sitting in a closet somewhere and Clay said ‘Well, let’s get those digitized at least, let’s bring them up to the present.’
“And so he actually paid for a guy in Atlanta to digitize them, and then I sat on those because I thought I was going to learn how to do Pro Tools, but I never quite did that,” she said.
That’s when DB Recs founder Danny Beard got involved.
“So then Danny decided that he wanted to put it out,” Richmond Boston said. “When I got the hard drive back, I put some of these other songs on here, I went into the studio here in Atlanta with this really great guy, David Barbie, and we just remixed it, and then Jason Naismith, who also works at the same studio, mastered it, and that was that.”
Had she keep in touch with DB Records all that time?
“Yes because the Swimming Pool Qs are still playing, and I had gone back to start singing with them, and Danny comes to the shows,” she said. “Plus we’ve been friends forever and so I would see him and every once in a while, he wouldn’t really mention the record until just a few years ago. And then it was like, ‘Let’s do this.’ But yeah, we’ve remained friends for sure.”
How did she come up with the song “Dark Room?”
“It’s based on just sort of a friendship that I had with a person who just had this really dark side and I was hoping that they would come out of it and they never did,” she said. “I don’t really consider myself a songwriter or anything, but that one just came to me one day when I was thinking about that, and I don’t play an instrument at all much, but I had a guitar and I kinda worked that one out myself.”
The album “I Should Be Happy” seems like a lot of the songs have a nautical theme or some kind of water element.
“Watery yeah, well, I’m a Pisces,” Richmond Boston joked. “I think it was just happenstance. But there’s a lot of longing and loss in these songs and much more so with the new songs than the original. ‘Dark Room’ for instance has that theme to it.”
But while the songs have serious issues, the beats and rhythms are appealing.
“To me, it’s just that hope is always there, regardless of how sad and down and everything, there’s always hope for something better,” Richmond Boston said. “I think that’s where it comes from really.”
Searching for hope has always been a part of Richmond Boston’s life.
“In my personal life with my family, we had some mental illness in the family,” she said. “And I think that when I would see my mother going through episodes, I would remain hopeful that somehow she was going to be OK, even though it was just the scariest thing in the world. I think that kind of changed my way of approaching the world, where you just can’t give up. Things may not always work out or they may not always be what you want, but you’ve got to keep going.”
The song “Amazing” is one that has special significance, written for her daughter Caitlin by Rob Gal.
As for Rob, he’s not living in Atlanta any more, but he lives close enough by where he and daughter Caitlin can still visit.
“I’ve always admired his talent and all of that, so that will never stop,” she said.
As for her band, Richmond Boston said it gives her joy to get together.
“The Qs still play gigs,” she said. “It’s getting together with them and trying to work out the songs on a smaller scale without a whole big band and all this production, but doing it on a smaller scale. So that’s been great.”
“I love being on the road,” she said. “That was one of my favorite things about being in the band. And that’s part of of the charm of independent records and independent music.
How does Richmond Boston feel about what’s going on with the streaming services and the corporate takeover of independent music?
“Well it’s a double-edged sword,” she said. “It’s so much easier to put music out there now for people to hear. Of course when we were doing the corporate thing when we were on the label and the Qs were on the label, it was a different kind of thing.
“I’m really glad to be able to have a way to get this record out pretty easily on Bandcamp and just be able to upload it myself and and put it up there, so that’s good,” she said.
As for the reviews on the ‘new’ record?
“People have been really nice about it,” she said. “They really like it and they’re really glad that it’s finally out. It’s been very positive.”
Richmond Boston plays Nowhere Bar in Athens, Ga., on Saturday, July 18th.
For more information go to the Nowhere Bar Facebook page
The album “I Should Be Happy” is available on vinyl and CD through Bandcamp.
Album Credits:
Recorded at Snack ’n’ Shack, Atlanta, GA; Rob Gal, engineer/producer
Additional guitars and mandolin recorded at Electron Gardens, Atlanta, GA; Tim Delaney, engineer
Additional drums and keyboard recorded at Sound Witch, Hillsborough, NH; Laurie Sargent, engineer
Additional guitar, piano, and xylophone recorded at Chase Park Transduction Studios, Athens, GA; David Barbe, engineer/producer
“Who Cares” recorded at Benchmark Sound Studios, Inc., Atlanta, GA; Mark Allen, engineer
“The Wind Cries Mary” written by Jimi Hendrix, published by Experience Hendrix, L.L.C. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Tape transfer: Chris Griffin
All songs remixed at Chase Park Transduction Studios, Athens, GA; David Barbe and ARB
Mastered at Chase Park Transduction Studios, Athens GA; Jason NeSmith
Executive producer: Danny Beard
All rights reserved. Unauthorized duplication is a violation of applicable laws.
© 2025 DB Recs and Anne Richmond Boston
Design and front cover linocut: ARB; photo by Bart Boston, Winter Haven, Florida, 1968; inside photo by Jason Thrasher, 2025
All rights reserved. Unauthorized duplication is a violation of applicable laws.
A VERY SPECIAL THANKS TO
Clay Harper
Danny Beard
David Barbe
Jason NeSmith
McKendrick Bearden
Bob Elsey
Laurie Sargent
Billy Conway
Scott Sanders
The Swimming Pool Q’s
Rob Gal
John Cerreta
Eric Weissinger
Dirk Dominick
David Henderson
Bill Burton
Brad Quinn
Gary Brown
Michael Lorant
Sheila Doyle
Barry Sell
William Tonks
Michael Wegner
Matthew Sanborn
Marti Jones
Don Dixon
Matt Brown
Syd Straw
David Greenberger
Terry Adams
Caitlin Gal
Listen or order ‘I Should Be Happy’ here:
