The Painful Comforts of Loneliness: A Review of Paddy McAloon’s I Trawl The Megahertz

Loneliness is one of the greatest ironies of life: It isolates us, yet it’s one of the few universal experiences that impacts all of us. Whether it’s a new job or living in a new city, we’ve all found ourselves in some place or some time where we felt completely alone. 

But as painful as these times may be, there is beauty to be found. 

When you’re lonely, you find glimmers of comfort in the most unlikely places. You start picking up conversations from what you first ignored as senseless noises on the radio. Or, you hear the voices of strangers, and their words offer you a kindness you thought you could only ever expect from your loved ones. 

In loneliness, another stranger’s passing smile at the store becomes warmer; it’s proof that you’re still wanted here. And when the reassurance of a shoulder to cry on and an ear to listen to you comes, loneliness offers its final gift of beauty. These are the wonders that remind us how to fall in love again with being alive. 

I felt that loneliness when I studied abroad in Germany; I knew no one and could barely speak with my anxiety-riddled sense of German. I felt that wonder again when I found Paddy McAloon’s I Trawl The Megahertz. 

The Origins of I Trawl the Megahertz

This orchestral, ethereal album is a far cry from the typical pop rock sound of McAloon’s band, Prefab Sprout. However, Megahertz originated in rather exceptional circumstances, beginning with the bitter aftermath of an eye surgery that left McAloon blind and housebound for months. 

Separated from his world and trapped in “enforced idleness”, this period left McAloon depressed. To pass the time and to keep himself from going insane, he turned to audiobooks and talk shows on the radio. In those waves of noise, he would hear a certain word or phrase that felt like a bigger part of a narrative, and from these small gems, he found inspiration. 

When McAloon was well enough to work, he recorded random lines from radio broadcasts, brought on Yvonne Connors to serve as his narrator, and composed the nine songs that eventually became Prefab Sprout’s fourth studio album. Though it lies in comparative obscurity next to his many hits, I Trawl the Megahertz is McAloon’s undeniable magnum opus. 

The Lyricism of I Trawl the Megahertz

The 22-minute opening track alone serves as one of his greatest works of lyricism. The song tells the story of a woman who lives in her imagination and refuses to accept the disappointments of reality: “Trains are late, doctors are breaking bad news, but I am living in a lullaby.” 

Then, when she falls in love with someone, instead of acting on her feelings, she stays in her own world and worships them in her mind: “From an acorn of interest, I will cultivate whole forests of affection. I will analyse your gestures like centuries of scholars pouring over Jesus’ words. Anything that does not fit my narrow interpretation I will carelessly discard.” 

However, in her efforts to love the person only through her imagination, she loses them completely. She tries with all her effort to find them again, but her efforts are in vain: “I rake the sky, I listen hard, I trawl the megahertz, but the net isn’t fine enough, and I miss you.” 

This poem, combined with a repeating melody delivered by an alternating orchestra and lone trumpet, creates a bittersweet narrative. In her mind, she is free. There is peace within that freedom but also a profound loneliness. Whether out of fear or negligence, she spends so much time imagining love that she loses the chance to experience it for herself. 

That is the story of her life, stranger than song or fiction. 

The Sounds of I Trawl the Megahertz

The rest of the album sounds like the soundtrack of a lost Studio Ghibli film. The first moments of wonder come with “Espirit de Corps” and triumph with “Orchid 7”. Then, sorrow follows with a melody that echoes through the album like a broken record, starting in “Fall From Grace”, carrying into “We Were Poor…”, and finding its resolution in “…but We Were Happy.” 

But McAloon offers two notable exceptions. The first, “I’m 49”, features a symphony of trumpets and whistles over a compilation of radio show segments about the isolation and depression that follows a divorce. Though on its own, the orchestra would sound happy, the lines that echo turn this into the feeling reminiscent of smiling tears. 

The second is “Sleeping Rough,” and it’s the first and only song on the album to feature McAloon as he celebrates his loneliness by singing only a few words: 

I’m lost, yes I am lost. I’ll grow a long and silver beard and let it reach my knees. I’m lost, yes I am lost, and duty will not track me down asleep among the trees.

“Sleeping Rough” pictures the ultimate allure of loneliness: You don’t have to take care of anyone or worry about your responsibilities when you’re alone. The only problem is that these pleasures can’t be experienced unless you’re truly alone. 

Real freedom is beautiful, but that beauty can never be shared without first being broken. 

That is McAloon’s final message to the listener. It’s the lesson I learned when I finished the album and sat in the university library, tears in my eyes as I found the courage to ask one of my friends for coffee after class. The theme of beauty in brokenness makes this album one of McAloon’s finest works, if not one of the great albums made in the 21st century. 

Listen and Hear Its Message For Yourself

I Trawl the Megahertz is one of the most beautiful pieces of melodic melancholy I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing. This work soothes the heart as both a lullaby and an ode to the lonely, but its comfort also carries a clear warning: If we spend our lives living in the fantasies in our head, we will lose the lives we were meant to live. 

So find a copy, sink into the experience it offers you, and use its words to carry you into the reality of your next step.

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