Retro is no dirty word to this reviewer, steeped in nostalgia as I am and with a ghostly steam of the past rising from my aural appreciation like dew in the morning sun – and clearly not averse either to the extended metaphor – but I am nonetheless equally enamoured when contemporary bands bring a fresh brushstroke to Rock’s ancient paintwork.
Fresno California band Le Wolves do just that with this
eponymous release, their ‘good shags’ Rock and Roll a track to track burn-up of
wheel spun punkrock, lots of screeching in the guitars, drums bombarding, and
vocals surrounded by screams and an apparent chorus of echoing shouts including
coughs – well you would have to. There are two longish songs, Wizardry is one at four minutes like the
other, and this is quite delicate, in a comparative way with more control in
the screeching guitar work and shouted chorus – even the drums slow to a steady
beat for more screeching guitar to sway above – and the vocal is sweetly
progfolkrock until there is a speeded up return to the song’s core line. This
is actually quite a complex song cycle, in the rock basics scheme of things.
But the screams keep it symptomatic. Great stuff.
Hit Me Slow Like an
Overdose follows this, and the burn-up is back on fire, the vocal hollowed
out to a background scatter so that the instruments drive it all, punk rhythms,
pounding bass and those pummelling drums. Way
Back Home then arrives on the same bullet train merging punk and psychedelia,
a brief guitar solo of sublime fuzziness. The rest is the same wildness, though
Juanita, the other four-minuter, is
lightened with a trebled bass and bird-like guitar riffs, though there is still
some screeching. What an excellent rousing early evening's listen this has been
Can be heard here.
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