...and now the rest of the story:
They should have just started a 35-date European tour as guests of The Hold Steady, who pulled all their shows earlier this week due to the hospitalisation of guitarist Tad Kubler. Instead, Philadelphia’s War On Drugs find themselves stranded in London, where they were probably considering busking as an alternative to starving on the capital’s streets before being added at the last minute to tonight’s Club Uncut bill at the Borderline.
Continued...
I’m sympathetic to their current circumstances and being left on their uppers by the cancellation of the Hold Steady tour and the exposure it would have brought them is no joke in anyone’s language. At the same time, I’m wholly glad they’re here tonight, because what their opening set, a frantic 30 minutes or so, packed from floor to ceiling with moments of startling rapture and abandoned mayhem, is as good as anything I’ve seen all year.
You may have read in reviews of their debut album, Wagonwheel Blues, that WOD’s music occupies an interface between the classic American songwriting of Dylan, Springsteen and Tom Petty and the sonic adventures of The Velvet Underground, say, or My Bloody Valentine.
It’s a notion you may briefly have entertained and them dismissed without hearing the album as surely fanciful. The thing is, the description – especially when you hear them live – isn’t at all far-fetched, begins in fact to feel like it actually undersells a lot of the amazing things they get up to and the fearsome noise of which they are capable, breathtakingly exciting aural landscapes wrought from nothing more apparently than a Rickenbacker, a drummer with the dynamic whack of the young Mitch Mitchell, an acoustic guitar and what looks like an array of wired-up kitchen utensils one of the band must have found at the back of someone’s garage.
They’ve just started “Arms Like Boulders”, which also opens Wagonwheel Blues, when I arrive hot-foot from Pete Molinari’s Uncut promotion at Borders and they are already in full flight, Adam Granduciel, looking beneath a tangle of hair uncannily at times like lost West Coast singer-songwriter Dino Valente, whaling away on a battered acoustic guitar, the band whipping up a firestorm behind him.
You can hear echoes in his voice of Petty, for sure, but the exclamatory phrasing, daring and acute, is more noticeably reminiscent of a Dylan just gone electric and simply buzzing. You can hear Dylan in the following “Taking The Farm”, but here the backing sounds like a demented version of Paul Simon’s “Graceland”, warped, furious, insanely catchy.
As is, you’d have to say, the somewhat more serene drift of “Buenos Aires Beach” they’re playing now, its warm glow an overture to the absolute meltdown of the 10-minute “Show Me The Coast” they play next. Years ago, in Glasgow, I saw Dylan play a version of “Masters Of War”, whose arrangement that night seemed inspired by the Velvet Underground’s “Black Angel’s Death Song”. Tonight, War On Drugs give us a hint of what it might have sounded like if Bob had appeared on “Sister Ray”, whose relentless annihilation is fearsomely replicated.
They end with an equally fierce version of “A Needle In Your Eye #16”, which Granduciel reminds the audience appeared on Uncut’s Let It Roll CD that accompanied “issue 152, the one with Liam or Noel Gallagher, the ugly brother, whoever he is” on the cover.
War On Drugs have been so good that what follows has an almost inevitable air of anti-climax.
alan jones, Editor of UNCUT magazine
Sunday, October 5, 2008
...and now the rest of the story:
They should have just started a 35-date European tour as guests of The Hold Steady, who pulled all their shows earlier this week due to the hospitalisation of guitarist Tad Kubler. Instead, Philadelphia’s War On Drugs find themselves stranded in London, where they were probably considering busking as an alternative to starving on the capital’s streets before being added at the last minute to tonight’s Club Uncut bill at the Borderline.
Continued...
I’m sympathetic to their current circumstances and being left on their uppers by the cancellation of the Hold Steady tour and the exposure it would have brought them is no joke in anyone’s language. At the same time, I’m wholly glad they’re here tonight, because what their opening set, a frantic 30 minutes or so, packed from floor to ceiling with moments of startling rapture and abandoned mayhem, is as good as anything I’ve seen all year.
You may have read in reviews of their debut album, Wagonwheel Blues, that WOD’s music occupies an interface between the classic American songwriting of Dylan, Springsteen and Tom Petty and the sonic adventures of The Velvet Underground, say, or My Bloody Valentine.
It’s a notion you may briefly have entertained and them dismissed without hearing the album as surely fanciful. The thing is, the description – especially when you hear them live – isn’t at all far-fetched, begins in fact to feel like it actually undersells a lot of the amazing things they get up to and the fearsome noise of which they are capable, breathtakingly exciting aural landscapes wrought from nothing more apparently than a Rickenbacker, a drummer with the dynamic whack of the young Mitch Mitchell, an acoustic guitar and what looks like an array of wired-up kitchen utensils one of the band must have found at the back of someone’s garage.
They’ve just started “Arms Like Boulders”, which also opens Wagonwheel Blues, when I arrive hot-foot from Pete Molinari’s Uncut promotion at Borders and they are already in full flight, Adam Granduciel, looking beneath a tangle of hair uncannily at times like lost West Coast singer-songwriter Dino Valente, whaling away on a battered acoustic guitar, the band whipping up a firestorm behind him.
You can hear echoes in his voice of Petty, for sure, but the exclamatory phrasing, daring and acute, is more noticeably reminiscent of a Dylan just gone electric and simply buzzing. You can hear Dylan in the following “Taking The Farm”, but here the backing sounds like a demented version of Paul Simon’s “Graceland”, warped, furious, insanely catchy.
As is, you’d have to say, the somewhat more serene drift of “Buenos Aires Beach” they’re playing now, its warm glow an overture to the absolute meltdown of the 10-minute “Show Me The Coast” they play next. Years ago, in Glasgow, I saw Dylan play a version of “Masters Of War”, whose arrangement that night seemed inspired by the Velvet Underground’s “Black Angel’s Death Song”. Tonight, War On Drugs give us a hint of what it might have sounded like if Bob had appeared on “Sister Ray”, whose relentless annihilation is fearsomely replicated.
They end with an equally fierce version of “A Needle In Your Eye #16”, which Granduciel reminds the audience appeared on Uncut’s Let It Roll CD that accompanied “issue 152, the one with Liam or Noel Gallagher, the ugly brother, whoever he is” on the cover.
War On Drugs have been so good that what follows has an almost inevitable air of anti-climax.
The Dudes are loud and rocky, two of them sport unfashionable moustaches and severe haircuts and a third is wearing an AC/DC T-shirt. I’d been expecting some bar band rumble, but they turn out, surprisingly, to be more Queen than Crazy Horse. On one number with a typically big chorus, they even attempt a kind of “Radio Ga Ga” clap-along.
Vancouver’s Ladyhawk are louder and hairier, their between-song banter makes them sound like characters from South Park and with names like Duffy Driediger, Darcy Hancock and Sean Hawryluk, they would not be out of place among Thomas Pynchon’s intrepid Chums Of Chance in Against The Day.
alan jones, Editor of UNCUT magazine
They should have just started a 35-date European tour as guests of The Hold Steady, who pulled all their shows earlier this week due to the hospitalisation of guitarist Tad Kubler. Instead, Philadelphia’s War On Drugs find themselves stranded in London, where they were probably considering busking as an alternative to starving on the capital’s streets before being added at the last minute to tonight’s Club Uncut bill at the Borderline.
Continued...
I’m sympathetic to their current circumstances and being left on their uppers by the cancellation of the Hold Steady tour and the exposure it would have brought them is no joke in anyone’s language. At the same time, I’m wholly glad they’re here tonight, because what their opening set, a frantic 30 minutes or so, packed from floor to ceiling with moments of startling rapture and abandoned mayhem, is as good as anything I’ve seen all year.
You may have read in reviews of their debut album, Wagonwheel Blues, that WOD’s music occupies an interface between the classic American songwriting of Dylan, Springsteen and Tom Petty and the sonic adventures of The Velvet Underground, say, or My Bloody Valentine.
It’s a notion you may briefly have entertained and them dismissed without hearing the album as surely fanciful. The thing is, the description – especially when you hear them live – isn’t at all far-fetched, begins in fact to feel like it actually undersells a lot of the amazing things they get up to and the fearsome noise of which they are capable, breathtakingly exciting aural landscapes wrought from nothing more apparently than a Rickenbacker, a drummer with the dynamic whack of the young Mitch Mitchell, an acoustic guitar and what looks like an array of wired-up kitchen utensils one of the band must have found at the back of someone’s garage.
They’ve just started “Arms Like Boulders”, which also opens Wagonwheel Blues, when I arrive hot-foot from Pete Molinari’s Uncut promotion at Borders and they are already in full flight, Adam Granduciel, looking beneath a tangle of hair uncannily at times like lost West Coast singer-songwriter Dino Valente, whaling away on a battered acoustic guitar, the band whipping up a firestorm behind him.
You can hear echoes in his voice of Petty, for sure, but the exclamatory phrasing, daring and acute, is more noticeably reminiscent of a Dylan just gone electric and simply buzzing. You can hear Dylan in the following “Taking The Farm”, but here the backing sounds like a demented version of Paul Simon’s “Graceland”, warped, furious, insanely catchy.
As is, you’d have to say, the somewhat more serene drift of “Buenos Aires Beach” they’re playing now, its warm glow an overture to the absolute meltdown of the 10-minute “Show Me The Coast” they play next. Years ago, in Glasgow, I saw Dylan play a version of “Masters Of War”, whose arrangement that night seemed inspired by the Velvet Underground’s “Black Angel’s Death Song”. Tonight, War On Drugs give us a hint of what it might have sounded like if Bob had appeared on “Sister Ray”, whose relentless annihilation is fearsomely replicated.
They end with an equally fierce version of “A Needle In Your Eye #16”, which Granduciel reminds the audience appeared on Uncut’s Let It Roll CD that accompanied “issue 152, the one with Liam or Noel Gallagher, the ugly brother, whoever he is” on the cover.
War On Drugs have been so good that what follows has an almost inevitable air of anti-climax.
The Dudes are loud and rocky, two of them sport unfashionable moustaches and severe haircuts and a third is wearing an AC/DC T-shirt. I’d been expecting some bar band rumble, but they turn out, surprisingly, to be more Queen than Crazy Horse. On one number with a typically big chorus, they even attempt a kind of “Radio Ga Ga” clap-along.
Vancouver’s Ladyhawk are louder and hairier, their between-song banter makes them sound like characters from South Park and with names like Duffy Driediger, Darcy Hancock and Sean Hawryluk, they would not be out of place among Thomas Pynchon’s intrepid Chums Of Chance in Against The Day.
alan jones, Editor of UNCUT magazine
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
The War on Drugs is going back out on the road in October. The Hold Steady requested we open for them on their entire European tour so it took about 16 seconds to decide...We'll also be doing a bunch of Headlining shows on our days off...one of which is our triumphant return to The Windmill in Brixton. More shows should be added in the next few days...
And, of course, to our friends in the states....we'll be coming around very soon..hopefully December.
Also, if you live in one of the beautiful cities below and don't mind us staying with you one night...let us know and you'll get two free passes to the show.
'till then:
September 29 - Academy, Oxford
September 30 - Academy, Manchester
October 1 - ABC, Glascow
October 2 - Wulfrun Hall, Wolverhampton
Ocotber 3 - Norwich Arts center, Norwich (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 4 - Anson Rooms, Bristol
October 5 - Rock City, Nottingham
October 6 - Pyramids, Portsmouth
October 7 - Windmill, Brixton (DRUGS HEADLINE, with Super Nashwan)
October 8 - Roundhouse, London
October 9 - Nouveau Casino, Paris
October 10 - La Materies, Lille (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 11 - Knust, Hamburg
October 12 - Luxor, Koln
October 13 - Melkweg, Amsterdam
October 15 - MONO, Oslo (Drugs Headline)
October 16 - Debaser, Stockholm
October 17 - Sticky Fingers, Goteberg
October 18 - Debaser, Malmo w/ Xiu Xiu (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 19 - Vega, Copenhagen
October 20 - Columbia Club, Berlin
October 21 - WUK, Vienna
October 22 - Ampere, Munich
October 23 - Lokomotiv, Bologna, Italy (Drugs Headline)
October 25 - Heineken Green Space Festival w/ Animal Collective, Valencia
You can still buy "Wagonwheel Blues" RIGHT HERE!! IT RULES!
And, of course, to our friends in the states....we'll be coming around very soon..hopefully December.
Also, if you live in one of the beautiful cities below and don't mind us staying with you one night...let us know and you'll get two free passes to the show.
'till then:
September 29 - Academy, Oxford
September 30 - Academy, Manchester
October 1 - ABC, Glascow
October 2 - Wulfrun Hall, Wolverhampton
Ocotber 3 - Norwich Arts center, Norwich (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 4 - Anson Rooms, Bristol
October 5 - Rock City, Nottingham
October 6 - Pyramids, Portsmouth
October 7 - Windmill, Brixton (DRUGS HEADLINE, with Super Nashwan)
October 8 - Roundhouse, London
October 9 - Nouveau Casino, Paris
October 10 - La Materies, Lille (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 11 - Knust, Hamburg
October 12 - Luxor, Koln
October 13 - Melkweg, Amsterdam
October 15 - MONO, Oslo (Drugs Headline)
October 16 - Debaser, Stockholm
October 17 - Sticky Fingers, Goteberg
October 18 - Debaser, Malmo w/ Xiu Xiu (DRUGS HEADLINE)
October 19 - Vega, Copenhagen
October 20 - Columbia Club, Berlin
October 21 - WUK, Vienna
October 22 - Ampere, Munich
October 23 - Lokomotiv, Bologna, Italy (Drugs Headline)
October 25 - Heineken Green Space Festival w/ Animal Collective, Valencia
You can still buy "Wagonwheel Blues" RIGHT HERE!! IT RULES!
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Buy "Wagonwheel Blues" HERE!!
YO! The War on Drugs headlining tomorrow night, August 1st, at Union Pool in Brooklyn. Set time is scheduled for 11:30. This is the last US show for a while as we leave for Europe and Beirut next week. First show's in Amsterdam and we'll be riding the high all the way through the uk, france, belgium, ireland and beirut. Check us out at the Green Man festival in South Wales, La Route Du Rock in St. Malo France and the Big Bang fest in Beirut, Lebanon to close out the tour. We'll be heading to Spain for a festival in Later october so we haven't forgot our friends there! Ok...come out to brooklyn tomorrow. Big Band for this one. Just blew the roof off the TLA opening for Spiritualized so check it 0ut.
08/08/08 Amsterdam, Netherlands - Paradiso
08/09/08 Venlo, Netherlands - Zomerparkfeest
08/10/08 Courcelles, Belgium - La Posterie
08/11/08 London, UK - The Old Blue Last
08/12/08 London, UK - Club Fandango at Dublin Castle
08/13/08 Farnham, UK - The William Cobbett
08/14/08 St. Malo, France - Le Festival du Rock
08/15/08 Crickhowell, South Wales - Green Man Festival
08/16/08 Yeovil, UK - Orange Box
08/17/08 Dublin, Ireland - Crawdaddy
08/18/08 Bristol, UK - Thekla Social
08/20/08 Brixton, UK - Windmill w/ Bowerbirds
08/23/08 Beirut, Lebanon - Big Bang Festival
Good Shit here
Also here
here too
Awesome
YO! The War on Drugs headlining tomorrow night, August 1st, at Union Pool in Brooklyn. Set time is scheduled for 11:30. This is the last US show for a while as we leave for Europe and Beirut next week. First show's in Amsterdam and we'll be riding the high all the way through the uk, france, belgium, ireland and beirut. Check us out at the Green Man festival in South Wales, La Route Du Rock in St. Malo France and the Big Bang fest in Beirut, Lebanon to close out the tour. We'll be heading to Spain for a festival in Later october so we haven't forgot our friends there! Ok...come out to brooklyn tomorrow. Big Band for this one. Just blew the roof off the TLA opening for Spiritualized so check it 0ut.
08/08/08 Amsterdam, Netherlands - Paradiso
08/09/08 Venlo, Netherlands - Zomerparkfeest
08/10/08 Courcelles, Belgium - La Posterie
08/11/08 London, UK - The Old Blue Last
08/12/08 London, UK - Club Fandango at Dublin Castle
08/13/08 Farnham, UK - The William Cobbett
08/14/08 St. Malo, France - Le Festival du Rock
08/15/08 Crickhowell, South Wales - Green Man Festival
08/16/08 Yeovil, UK - Orange Box
08/17/08 Dublin, Ireland - Crawdaddy
08/18/08 Bristol, UK - Thekla Social
08/20/08 Brixton, UK - Windmill w/ Bowerbirds
08/23/08 Beirut, Lebanon - Big Bang Festival
Good Shit here
Also here
here too
Awesome
Friday, June 20, 2008
Yo friends!
Wagonwheel Blues is now available! You can buy it from the secretly canadian website or at your local record store (!!!) or a bunch of places online like Amazon...I also saw a few on ebay. Do it!
'Taking the Farm' was the song of the day today on NPR.org and they actually tried to dissect some meaning from it! Niiiice!
Anyway here are some recent reviews to persuade you to head downtown and ask for it.
- http://www.drownedinsound.com/release/view/13253
- "Philadelphia's War on Drugs have seem to come out of nowhere with an album that’s been in constant rotation on my stereo for the past month. Wagonwheel Blues is an amazing debut, and every time I listen I find different things that I love. At various moments I hear Dylan, Springsteen, the Walkmen, Animal Collective...the list goes on. It’s the perfect amalgamation of classic rock and modern day indie, with the songs to boot. And there’s no throwback or retro here, just all around great rock music. "Arms Like Boulders" opens the record with a wailing harmonica, a wall of guitars, and a Dylan-esque vocal delivery. It is one part-roots rock, one-part indie, and one truly great song. "Taking the Farm" (which we recently featured as our Download of the Week) is a distorted, barnstorming romp of a tune. Easily one of the best songs that I've heard all year, it’ll have you have you jumping around singing, and is sure to put a little spring in your step. Any time "Buenos Aires Beach" comes on the stereo, everybody here at OM immediately thinks of the discordant pop stylings of Animal Collective. I can hear it, but come on...can you be in any better company? Not a bad reference, at all! "There Is No Urgency" starts with a wall of noise, then kicks in like a lost song by NY's very own the Walkmen while "A Needle in Your Eye #16" has a slight Velvet Underground feel, with a repetitious melody and some killer, witty lyrics. Damn, does this album have a bad song? Well, to tell you the truth… not a single one! The War on Drugs have given us one of the best debuts of the year..." - other music, NYC
Upcoming:
July 11th - WXPN Festival in Camden, NJ
July 13th - Mercury Lounge, NYC w/ Titus Andronicus (drugs on first)
July 19th - TBA, philadelphia
August 9-20: European Tour/Festival Dates w/ Spiritualized,Sigur Ros, Magik Markers and more!
Wagonwheel Blues is now available! You can buy it from the secretly canadian website or at your local record store (!!!) or a bunch of places online like Amazon...I also saw a few on ebay. Do it!
'Taking the Farm' was the song of the day today on NPR.org and they actually tried to dissect some meaning from it! Niiiice!
Anyway here are some recent reviews to persuade you to head downtown and ask for it.
- http://www.drownedinsound.com/release/view/13253
- "Philadelphia's War on Drugs have seem to come out of nowhere with an album that’s been in constant rotation on my stereo for the past month. Wagonwheel Blues is an amazing debut, and every time I listen I find different things that I love. At various moments I hear Dylan, Springsteen, the Walkmen, Animal Collective...the list goes on. It’s the perfect amalgamation of classic rock and modern day indie, with the songs to boot. And there’s no throwback or retro here, just all around great rock music. "Arms Like Boulders" opens the record with a wailing harmonica, a wall of guitars, and a Dylan-esque vocal delivery. It is one part-roots rock, one-part indie, and one truly great song. "Taking the Farm" (which we recently featured as our Download of the Week) is a distorted, barnstorming romp of a tune. Easily one of the best songs that I've heard all year, it’ll have you have you jumping around singing, and is sure to put a little spring in your step. Any time "Buenos Aires Beach" comes on the stereo, everybody here at OM immediately thinks of the discordant pop stylings of Animal Collective. I can hear it, but come on...can you be in any better company? Not a bad reference, at all! "There Is No Urgency" starts with a wall of noise, then kicks in like a lost song by NY's very own the Walkmen while "A Needle in Your Eye #16" has a slight Velvet Underground feel, with a repetitious melody and some killer, witty lyrics. Damn, does this album have a bad song? Well, to tell you the truth… not a single one! The War on Drugs have given us one of the best debuts of the year..." - other music, NYC
Upcoming:
July 11th - WXPN Festival in Camden, NJ
July 13th - Mercury Lounge, NYC w/ Titus Andronicus (drugs on first)
July 19th - TBA, philadelphia
August 9-20: European Tour/Festival Dates w/ Spiritualized,Sigur Ros, Magik Markers and more!
Friday, May 30, 2008
Wagonwheel Blues now available for pre-order!!!
The LP comes with a coupon for downloadable tunes so you can still cruise the strip to it.
New Tour Dates!!
06/07/08 Philadelphia, PA - Johnny Brenda's - w/Kurt Vile and Ape School
08/08/08 Amsterdam, Netherlands - Paradiso
08/09/08 Venlo, Netherlands - Zomerparkfeest
08/10/08 Courcelles, Belgium - La Posterie
08/11/08 London, UK - The Old Blue Last
08/12/08 London, UK - Club Fandango at Dublin Castle
08/13/08 Farnham, UK - The William Cobbett
08/14/08 St. Malo, France - Le Festival du Rock
08/15/08 Crickhowell, South Wales - Green Man Festival
08/16/08 Yeovil, UK - Orange Box
08/17/08 Dublin, Ireland - Crawdaddy
08/18/08 Bristol, UK - Thekla Social
08/20/08 Brixton, UK - Windmill w/ Bowerbirds
The LP comes with a coupon for downloadable tunes so you can still cruise the strip to it.
New Tour Dates!!
06/07/08 Philadelphia, PA - Johnny Brenda's - w/Kurt Vile and Ape School
08/08/08 Amsterdam, Netherlands - Paradiso
08/09/08 Venlo, Netherlands - Zomerparkfeest
08/10/08 Courcelles, Belgium - La Posterie
08/11/08 London, UK - The Old Blue Last
08/12/08 London, UK - Club Fandango at Dublin Castle
08/13/08 Farnham, UK - The William Cobbett
08/14/08 St. Malo, France - Le Festival du Rock
08/15/08 Crickhowell, South Wales - Green Man Festival
08/16/08 Yeovil, UK - Orange Box
08/17/08 Dublin, Ireland - Crawdaddy
08/18/08 Bristol, UK - Thekla Social
08/20/08 Brixton, UK - Windmill w/ Bowerbirds
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