More than a year and a half ago, I dove headfirst into the White Laces universe by snagging their eponymous EP at Deep Groove Records, and I’ve been exploring the vast, dream-like spaces they create ever since. I wrote then that hearing them for the first time was like “like stepping on a live power line,” and the resulting delirium has yet to wear off, especially because the months since have seen them release new songs, new vinyl, new videos, and a fantastic debut full-length in MOVES. The rich sonic landscape they’ve carved out expanded even further last week, when Stereogum premiered the video for MOVES track “Heavy Nights” — a clip which offers a dark and winding take on the Wonderland trope that will irreversibly alter the degree of comfort you feel when looking at tea and fruit-topped cookies. To celebrate this new addition to the White Laces universe, I caught up with frontman Landis Wine via email about the video’s genesis and the band’s plans for the near future.
White Laces
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
When I first started writing this here blog, the idea was that each post would highlight a way of finding new music. There are a million-and-a-half avenues for discovering bands these days, and I thought it would helpful to sift through them and talk up the ones I found most fruitful. I still think about that each time I sit down to write a post, but I can’t deny that I’ve slipped in this area. (My self-control in the face of Super Bowl halftime shows and “Gangnam Style” is pretty much non-existent.)
With that shortfall in mind, I’d like to keep up the momentum I generated from yesterday’s post — here’s another link to the fantastic 70 Day Weekend — by dedicating this post to the people who are, without question, the reason I’m enjoying Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s new album so much. In this case, though, it’s not about who recommended Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend! Instead, I’d like to talk about the bands that paved the way for my appreciation of an album I might not have given a fair shake a few years ago — bands that have opened my eyes to the glorious, noisy rock being made here in Richmond and elsewhere.
White Laces
“One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.”
— Bob Marley
With all due respect, Bob is wrong on this one.
I mean, I get what he’s saying, that music wields a special type of nonviolent power, but some of my favorite songs are the ones that hit you where it hurts — on gut-churning topics like mortality, heartbreak and loneliness — with intensity that you can actually feel. Those are the songs I find most vital. They’re the records I’d grab first before escaping from a burning building. Their impact is essential, in every meaning of the word.
Before I’d even had a chance to listen to it, my experience with White Laces’ debut full-length Moves could already be described as “impactful.”
Wolf//Goat
I’m never going outside again. Ever.
Maybe you’ve seen the footage that was used to create the video for Richmond-based band Wolf//Goat’s “Madness Is Sanity.” I hadn’t. And I had no idea that in some mountainous corner of this beautiful green and blue planet we call home, EAGLES ARE PICKING UP BABY GOATS WITH THEIR TERRIFYING TALONS AND FLYING AWAY WITH THEM. I mean, seriously?!? If that doesn’t deserve an Independence-Day-style “My God…” I don’t know what does. My family wasn’t all that outdoorsy when I was growing up, but I definitely remember a mountain cabin trip or two, and I’m starting to think that it’s a miracle I made it out alive.
The video above is grisly to be sure, but it’s edited masterfully, bringing the song’s momentum shifts to life with a visceral brutality that has “recurring nightmare” written all over it. And I love that, in a twisted way, the clip offers an analogue to my short history with Wolf//Goat’s music.
Snowy Owls
Does one song give you enough information to write an entire concert review? No, it doesn’t. But can one song give you enough information to get ridiculously excited about a band? You betcha.
The plan was to make it to Gallery 5 in time to catch my first glimpse of The Snowy Owls, who were participating in this past Saturday’s “WRIR and The Commonwealth of Notions Presents: Volume Two” — a 10-band sampling of the Richmond music scene organized by WRIR’s Shannon Cleary. Unfortunately, I spent the majority of The Snowy Owls’ set eating trail mix while driving east on Monument Avenue, because I failed to leave on time AND forgot to eat dinner. Not my finest moment. The silver lining to my gold-star-worthy failure was extra shiny, however, because I made it to Gallery 5 in time to pay the $10 admission fee, snag a beer and settle into a spot near the back of the room as the first few notes of set closer “Yr Eyes” were starting up. In the four and a half minutes that followed, I learned a few important things…
White Laces
When White Laces announced the release date of their upcoming album MOVES yesterday, they also posted a link to a Soundcloud preview of one of its tracks, a beautifully layered and rapturously roomy song entitled “Crawl/Collapse.” Good things are clearly coming our way on August 21.
New Music Advent Calendar
I know it’s the beginning of June, but this past weekend got me thinking about Advent calendars. I’m convinced they’re magic. How else can you explain a poor, helpless piece of chocolate, with only the tensile strength of a perforated paper door to defend it, surviving the terrifying clutches of a sugar-crazed child’s hands for 25 whole days? You might as well be playing Jenga with Milk Bones on your dog’s nose.
So why was I thinking about Advent calendars? Is it because I’m one of those people who celebrate half Christmas? No siree Bob; my perception of time is way too poor to figure out when that even is. Is it because I’m turning into that creepy kid from Bad Santa? No, but let’s be honest — I’d grow that blonde ‘fro in a heartbeat if I could. The real reason is that three of the Richmond-based bands that I follow on Twitter, White Laces, The Snowy Owls and Hoax Hunters, are in the process of recording new music, and they’ve been tweeting from their respective studios about the proceedings.
These bite-sized missives have ranged from progress reporting to tantalizingly cryptic musing to revelatory pictures, and I can’t tell you how much I love this stuff. Even though they lack the chocolaty treats of a real-life Advent calendar (which is probably for the best, given that I somehow manged to eat both Popeye’s and Burger King for lunch this past Sunday), these brief hints have ratcheted up my excitement one notch at a time, and I can’t wait for the running-downstairs-on-Christmas-morning feeling I’ll get when the fruits of the labor they describe become available. In order to spread this excitement, I thought I’d do a quick roundup of some of the tweets I’ve seen recently. Call it a New Music Advent Calendar. The best part? You get all 25 at once! Let’s get started …
RVA Hot Sauce
I’ve mentioned this before, but when I started writing You Hear That, I had no idea how much amazing music is being made right here in Richmond, VA. During the course of the past year, I’ve been completely blown away by RVA’s homegrown tunes, and I owe a huge debt of gratitude to blogs like Richmond Playlist and Sounds of RVA for pointing me in all the right directions. And as inspired as I’ve been by outstanding groups like White Laces, Black Girls, Goldrush and The Trillions, there’s so much more to discover — especially when it comes to RVA hip hop. The Cheats Movement blog, which is a tremendous source for information about local rap artists (not to mention a seemingly bottomless well of positivity and enthusiasm), has helped me take a big step in that direction by posting the video above, which is the first in the series of clips that will document an event that took place on October 21, 2011 called RVA Hot Sauce. Much like the graffiti photos that got me hooked on Marc Cheatham’s blog several months ago, this video is a wake-up call as to the staggering amount of creativity flowing through this city, and I can’t wait to see the additional installments and hear more from performers like Black Liquid. Watch him and several other talented RVA folks in action in the video above (seeing Brian McDaniel from Dirty Richmond freestyle is particularly awesome), listen below to an older Black Liquid tune called “Life,” and keep an eye out for more RVA Hot Sauce videos down the road.
Black Liquid — “Life“
Arches
(Click here for Part 1 of my review of the White Laces/Arches split 7-inch. Apologies up front for not addressing the yellow cassette that came with my pre-order, but it definitely deserves its own day in the sun.)
Dreams aren’t always made of cumulus clouds and unicorns. Even the most pleasant dreams have narrative surprises, shifting contexts and bouts with anxiety — all the messy side-effects of your brain’s attempt to file away the bazillion thoughts and images it has to absorb on a daily basis. I’ve fallen for Arches song “Late Last Night” because it illustrates how beautifully dream-like a song really can be, and not just because of its relaxed tempo or reverb-heavy guitar and vocal treatments. “Late Last Night” graces the opposite side from White Laces’ “Dissolve Into Color” on the two Worthless Junk labelmates’ recently released split 7-inch record, and it provides a fascinating counterbalance to its companion track. Sure, you start out floating happily along, riding the gentle waves of sliding and bending lead guitar lines, but just when you’re lulled into a state of relaxation, the song takes a sudden turn, with increased distortion and intensity. This darker cloud lifts soon enough, but the damage is done. Your sense of security is shot and you’re left waiting for the other turbulent shoe to drop. Herein lies the song’s strength — its shifts mimic brilliantly the way dreams evolve unexpectedly, without warning and seemingly without reason. When I wrote on Friday about White Laces’ side of the record, I spent some time talking about how much I loved the song’s ending. “Late Last Night” satisfies till its very last moments, as well. If you listen closely to the nearly minute-long drone that brings the song to a close, you’ll hear the tone kick up slightly just before it drops out. This makes me so happy, in part because I can’t help but think of the climactic scene in meta-scary movie Scream, in which one of the survivors correctly predicts that the killer, who appears to be dead, actually has one more scare left in him (before Neve Campbell shoots him in the head like a boss). That subtle tonal shift is a fitting end to the fitful sleep that “Late Last Night” affords, and I highly recommend that you click play below and see where the dream takes you. If you dig, you can buy the 7-inch from Worthless Junk Records here or name your price for a digital download of “Late Last Night” here.
Arches — “Late Last Night“
White Laces
Last Sunday, I came home to find a very exciting and much-anticipated parcel sitting on my porch. It was a smallish cardboard box that enclosed 3 items: a Worthless Junk Records sticker, the new White Laces/Arches split 7″ and a yellow cassette with “W.L.” handwritten on one side and “AR” on the other. Because there’s a whole lot of awesome going on in this parcel, I’m splitting up my thoughts into two parts, starting with White Laces’ side of the record. Recorded at Mystic Fortress studio in Roanoke and etched into super-groovy colored vinyl, “Dissolve Into Color” is a wonderfully expressive song, and it bears one of the trademark characteristics that make White Laces so exceptional — the band’s unique ability to create sonic space, and lots of it. Doubled vocals and undulating guitars with elastic lead notes create a feeling of lateral movement that, when combined with driving, forward momentum-building drums and bass, pushes the boundaries of the song outward in all directions. Such spaciousness makes it easy to lose yourself in “Dissolve Into Color,” especially when it kicks into high gear during the instrumental buildup that comprises the final quarter of the song. Starting with just drums and two notes played back and forth on guitar, the crescendo builds and builds like a game of Jenga being played in reverse, until all the elements are in place, forming a massive-sounding structure that feels powerful and solid even as it maintains its elasticity. Another thing I love about this song is the brief epilogue that brings it to a close. After the buildup climaxes and several of the instruments drop out, the crescendo’s din temporarily remains, feeling less like an afterthought than a spirit that refuses to leave. This yearning piece of punctuation is just one of the many things “Dissolve Into Color” does well, and I encourage you to listen below, snag the record here, and check back for Part 2, in which I’ll take a look at Arches song “Late Last Night” and the mysterious yellow cassette.
White Laces — “Dissolve Into Color“
You Hear That 