Back in January we featured an EP by The Wandering Lake and said that the band were working on their debut album. Now the time is upon us, Wend to Why has been welcomed to the light of day. As we mentioned in the last post, The Wandering Lake has been around for a long time, but lead Brian Kupillas has now recruited a band and is attempting to craft songs in a slightly different way. As the blurb puts it: “He has taken large steps in introducing concreteness to the project which for so long lived without tempo or much in the way of traditional (though perhaps contemporary is a better word) rhythm“. What that translates to is a sound part indie rock and part psychedelic folk, all weaved together with Kupillas’ distinctive vocals, which are not quite a warble and not quite a croon and sometimes drawn out landscape-scale without a hint of breaking.
The vocals on opener ‘I Hope I Meet All of You Again’ sound a little like J. Tillman crossed with Hamilton Leithauser, and indeed Tillman/Father John Misty and (Lisbon-era) The Walkmen were the acts my mind kept referring to as I listened to the album. The vocals are supported by meandering laid-back acoustics and some of The Wandering Lake’s trademark otherworldly “ooohs”. ‘Mono No Aware’ is more reminiscent of Angel Olsen, with quavering lead vocals and a sedate and dreamy atmosphere, while ‘Lily Pad’ is swooning and rhythmic and ‘Memphis’ uses strummed acoustic guitars to produce the musical equivalent of a lazy summer’s day. ‘Return to View’ sets Kupillas’s vocals to thumping indie rock with a fuzzed out background, producing something akin to The War on Drugs, something exciting and vaguely triumphant, a punchy peak in an otherwise mellow sea of azure blue.
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Personal stand-out ‘O Sky’ is wonderfully sinuous and hazy, before a crescendo breaks in with drawn out howling vocals and a barrage of drums. It’s a really great song. Like, one of my favourites of the year good. Next up is ‘Swimming Hole’, which is half-paced and languid, swaying along as if in a warm breeze, and then ‘It’s You!’ teams lush, almost tropical instrumentation with languorous percussion. The album closes with ‘Then Where To Go’, which has a by-now familiar vibe basking blissfully in the warm glow of long afternoon.
You can get Wend to Why via the Whatever Tapes Bandcamp page. You can also get a super cool, 20-page art zine, made by Paul Sanders and Kupillas’s brother Joe (see below), if you’re so inclined. The band are also going out on tour very soon. Check the dates via their Bandcamp page.
