The War On Drugs – Slave Ambient

[Anonym Inaktiv Registriert seit: 01.01.1970 Beiträge: 0]

The deeper we dig into modern music, the less our tastes make any real sense. For years, we found it curious, this equal devotion to Tom Petty and Spacemen 3, artists who made some of their most pivotal records at nearly the same time but with polar approaches. Or how about our mirrored admiration of Neu! ’75 and Blood on the Tracks, two very different albums from two different continents that happen to share a release year and a major place in our hearts? Flying Saucer Attack and Springsteen? New Order and No Wave? The Byrds and Bread and Burt Bacharach? How is a music fan supposed to reconcile all of this?

Fall in love with Philadelphia’s The War on Drugs. The vehicle of Adam Granduciel — frontman, rambler, shaman, pied piper guitarist and apparent arranger-extraordinaire — The War on Drugs seemed similarly obsessed with disparate ideas, with building uncompromised rock monuments from pieces that might have seemed odd pairs. On their debut, the life-affirming Wagonwheel Blues, folk-rock marathons come damaged by drum machines. Electronic and instrumental reprises precede songs they’ve yet to play, and Dr. Seuss becomes lyrical motivation for bold futuristic visions.

Now, Granduciel has done it again, better than before: Slave Ambient, their proper second album, is a brilliant 47-minute sprawl of rock ’n‘ roll, conceptualized with a sense of adventure and captured with seasons of bravado. Slave Ambient features a team of Philadelphia’s finest musicians, including multi-instrumentalists Dave Hartley and Robbie Bennett, and drummer Mike Zanghi. Recorded throughout the last four years at Granduciel’s home studio in Philly, Jeff Ziegler’s Uniform Recording and Echo Mountain in Asheville, NC, the album puts the weirdest influences in just the right places. Synthesizers fall where you might expect more electric guitars (and vice versa); country-rock sidles up to the warped extravagance of ’80s pop. Instant classic „Baby Missiles“ is part Springsteen fever dream, part motorik anthem. „Original Slave“ might sound like a hillbilly power drone, but „City Reprise #12“ suggests Phil Collins un-retiring to back Harmonia. „I Was There“ is Harvest rebuilt by some selection of psychedelic all-stars, while the shuffling, sleepy opener „Best Night“ offers a band with too many ideas to be in a hurry. During the mid-album centerpiece „Come to the City,“ Granduciel howls and moans, „All roads lead to me/ I’ve been moving/ I’ve been drifting.“ Indeed, however unlikely that might seem, all these sounds arrive cohesively in one unmistakable place.

The War on Drugs are one of the most exciting young rock ’n‘ roll bands in the world. People question that conviction, unconvinced that an act so new or with such clear historical forebears could absolutely be called a favorite. Sure, The War on Drugs‘ music overflows with echoes and strains of the songs and sounds we’ve all loved, yet it always feels singular and seamless, a perfect and pure distillation of influences into something that sounds like nothing else. Every song on Slave Ambient is instantly identifiable and infinitely intricate, a latticework of ideas and energies building into mile-high rock anthems. They are songs for future converts, welcome signs for folks who should, soon enough, also call The War on Drugs their favorite young rock ’n‘ roll band on the planet. — GRAYSON CURRIN

Secretly Canadian

Neues Album der alten Band von Kurt Vile. Hier gibt’s die erste Vorabsingle „Baby Missiles“.

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[Anonym Inaktiv Registriert seit: 01.01.1970 Beiträge: 0]

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[elston-gunn Registriert seit: 13.10.2006 Beiträge: 611]

„Baby Missiles“ läuft gerade in Dauerschleife, fantastisch!

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[Anonym Inaktiv Registriert seit: 01.01.1970 Beiträge: 0]

BNM

PitchforkBut as much as the War on Drugs make music to accompany an escape to something better, they’re the sort of band that believes the journey is more important than the destination. The songs on Slave Ambient don’t necessarily end in a place very different from where they began, but through subtle sonic manipulations and layering– like in the last two minutes of opener „Best Night“, where the guitars, piano, and melodica start to blur into the same blissful wavelength– they give the impression that a great distance has been traveled. The really amazing thing about the album is how anthemic and affirming it feels despite the near total absence of proper sing-along choruses. Case in point, centerpiece track „Come to the City“ is all about ascension, rising out of the miasmic haze of preceding interlude „The Animator“ and gradually accruing all the confidence and verve of Live Aid-era U2. But rather than work up a chest-thumping, Bono-worthy wail, Granduciel is happy to sit back and ride out the song’s dense waves of sound, to prolong the euphoric feeling of anticipation– the road trip he’s soundtracking is very much his own, and he’s as much a slave to the ambience as we are.

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[juan Registriert seit: 20.07.2009 Beiträge: 523]

Der bessere Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Jeder Song klingt wie der zuvor, und alle sind großartig.

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[elston-gunn Registriert seit: 13.10.2006 Beiträge: 611]

juanJeder Song klingt wie der zuvor, und alle sind großartig.

Besser kann man’s nicht ausdrücken. Dennoch herausragend: „Brothers“, „Your Love Is Calling My Name“, „Come to the City“.

Videos wie dieses machen mich schon ganz heiß aufs Konzert.

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