I heard The New Wild (TNW) a few
months ago with literally nothing in way of having any expectation for their
sound, even what genre they were. I went in completely blind. Since listening
to them the first time I have noticed they have classified themselves as “Freakish
Blues” which I think is beautiful and fitting.
When I
flicked on their EP I was delighted to hear slurry, sloppy, frothy blues come
out of the speakers right away. No build up. No warning strums to get me ready
for the blues that were to come. I have only recently gotten into down and
dirty blues like George Thorogood (most of his tracks being about whiskey has
nothing to do with it, okay!) and Joe Bonamassa and I’ve been looking for a new
band to get into and actively listen to so I can satisfy the bluesy hole I had.
It looks like turning on TNW’s EP was a wonderful choice.
With their
grungy, growly vocals and rough, bluesy guitar they’re the perfect answer to a
musical question. “Is there a place for blues, true blues, in a world where
blues music is tragically become more and more scarce?” Well, obviously the
answer is yes. Although the EP is a short one and in that way leaves the
listener feeling a little unsatisfied, the tracks are so musically, well, interesting
that even with just four tracks it at times feels like a full album. They do
not leave any stone unturned. They don’t leave any leaf untouched. The
shortness of their EP is easily made up by its efficiency to tell the tale they
came to tell.
TNW, with
an odd twist, add different genres and sounds to their tracks throughout the
EP. With little warning, their sound and overall genre shifts so fast that you
they have already shifted back to their default sound before you’ve even
noticed what’s happened.
The first song on the album, Dallas is a
perfect example of this. At first I was a little confused about the track. I
didn’t really find where it fit with their overlying sound. It sounded an
awkward pick for the vibe I was getting from them in the previous track. But
then I realized that I was looking in all the wrong places. I was searching for
a cookie cutter. Their previous song had established something for me that TNW
had no plan of establishing. Then, to both mess with me and explore their
musical boundaries, the sound started to change.
With the
inclusion of a garage-rock type sound in Dallas,
though I now understood where the motivation stemmed from, I was still foggy on
the influence. Until I did some extensive research and read their bio and
noticed the first band on their influences list; The White Stripes. This little
bud of knowledge served me well in two ways: 1. I was finally unburdened with
having to figure out where this seemingly new/random style was stemming from
and more importantly where it was going and 2. The EP actually started talking
to me as an album and not just a random compilation of songs and sounds that
were haphazardly thrown onto a disc.
Also on
said influences list are The Black Keys and Flat Duo Jets which are so
wonderfully prominent on the EP that I dare a listener not to see their finger
prints all over it.
My
favourite track on the EP is Wail. Not
just due to the radio friendly sound and the light story about music, sex and
love but because that wasn’t the only interesting and thought provoking thing
that caught my attention on this track. As soon as the song started when I
heard it for the first time I was all ready to start blasting it on having poor
balancing. The guitar was way, WAY louder than everything else. I’m glad I
continued to listen instead of making a silly first glance judgement because it
only took a minute to figure out why. Although a pretty simple track,
technically speaking, its simple qualities are easily forgotten once that loud,
bluesy, rough, gooey guitar shows its face in-between each chapter of the
story. The guitar work in-between these chapters I can only really describe as “cool”.
Another great surprise on the EP.
Finally, Play it By Fear is by far the most
complex track on the EP. Starting off with loud, overdriven guitar feedback flowing
into a guitar riff that I can only describe as Hendrix-y, the styles that are
explored on this song are as numerous as they are difficult to seamlessly flow
into one another. Let’s go through a few of the styles that I found on this
track. The song starts with overdriven rock guitar into a Hendrix-y acid rock
riff, then as the verse cuts in, all distortion disappears and it sounds like
Nirvana is doing a guest session with TNW then to break up the verses it slips
into a heavy rock kind of sound (although it could be argued that that Nirvana
was still visiting as it does remind me quite a bit of the chorus of Smells Like Teen Spirit). I think I may
be able to safely say that I have never heard these genres come head to head in
one three-minute song. And the complexity and sheer craftsmanship of the songs
seem to naturally come secondary to something that is ever-present throughout
the EP… It is just so cool.
The New
Wild is a great, unconventional “freakish blues” band that going in I had
absolutely zero expectations. All I have to say is that they surprised the shit
out of me and I’m glad they did. I have added them to my normal playlist on my
iPod and I highly suggest you do too.
The New Wild Stuff:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thenewwild?ref=br_tf
Bandcamp: http://thenewwild.bandcamp.com/
- Justin
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