OK, we’re six years into 2022. Time to get this rolling. Here’s a semi-fresh batch of new releases from Wilderun, Yard Act, and Punch Brothers. A little over a month in and there have already been some excellent albums hitting my ears, so I think we’re in for a legendary year. Fingers crossed.

Wilderun – Epigone
(January 7, 2022)

I’m wary of this band. Ever since I saw the nickname “Disney metal” with respect to their 2019 release Veil of Imagination I had placed this firmly in the “Not for Me” container. I gave it one or two listens, but waved it off as sappy, saccharine-infused symphonic folk metal. Cut to now, and the nickname “Disney metal” is still as pervasive as ever. But since I’m a SERIOUS MUSIC JOURNALIST now, I need to give it a fair shake, don’t I? It’s my duty as a SERIOUS MUSIC JOURNALIST to maintain the integrity that TWAS (Tom Whines About Stuff) demands! So what do I think of Epigone?

Here’s what I think: first of all, it takes a while for any metal to even show up! An epic, soaring, fanciful, metal grand entrance occurs just before the two-minute mark on “Woolgatherer”! That’s nearly six minutes of non-metal noodling! Who do these guys think they are?

But I got hooked. “Woolgatherer” itself is a fourteen-minute opus of tense acoustic melancholy buttressed by moments of blissful cathartic release (especially that one furious guitar solo around the eight-minute mark). And this masterful tension-and-release is a constant force, woven seamlessly through the lush grandeur of rumbling strings, crescendoing guitars, and Evan Anderson Berry’s stunning voice. He really does sound like a dang prince in a Disney movie. If you’re still skeptical by the end of “Woolgatherer”, “Passenger” brings in more action. Heavier riffs, faster tempos, swirling runaway string arrangements, waking you the fuck up if you happened to sleep for the last 20 minutes.

Notably, harsh vocals are used sparingly; utilized as a tool of dramatic effect during moments of particular turmoil. I’d personally like more of it, but I understand the necessity of not relying on them as a crutch. If I recall correctly, only one brief moment each of growly guttural goodness occurs in “Woolgatherer”, “Passenger”, and “Identifier”, which is saying something considering the size of these tracks.

I could say a lot about Epigone. I already have. I didn’t even talk about the final four tracks, the “Distraction” symphony, which is likely my favorite chunk of the album. I’ll save THAT for a full review. Progressive metal was my gateway to the metalverse in the mid-2000s with Porcupine Tree, Opeth, Dream Theater, Symphony X, and Fates Warning. While I’ve been largely disillusioned over the years by the genre (and half of those bands), Wilderun breathes new life into a genre I thought I outgrew completely. If you’re a picky prog fan who despises any nagging feelings of aimlessness or melodrama, you need to check this out. These Bostonians are on top of their game here. Early contender for my AOTY list, but the year is still quite young.

Early Verdict:

Yard Act – The Overload
(January 21, 2022)

2021 is going to be a tough year to beat when it comes to art punk debuts. Permit me to drop these names once again: Dry Cleaning, Squid, Black Country, New Road, Geese. Then of course there are solid non-debuts from 2021 to contend with: IDLES, black midi, Viagra Boys, Shame, Sleaford Mods, FACS, Snapped Ankles, et al. Yard Act is bold to go first in 2022 with all that before them to contend with. Their own presentation will have nothing BUT the 2021 successes to compare against, which hurts them already, but that’s not the only problem with The Overload.

Allow me to recognize the reality that this album will be a mind-blower for anyone completely new to the Mark E. Smith school of post-punk (assuming that this style will resonate in the first place). And, in fact, the titular opener is pretty mind-blowing stuff regardless. The musical phrasing is hyperactive, it’s choppy, there’s precision and care to the perceived mess, there are surprisingly hooky sudden time signature changes, there’s a speedy spoken-word bridge, there’s a really fucking good chorus melody, it’s funny, and the whole song is perfectly paced from start to finish. It’s a very early contender for my song of the year. I can’t get enough of it. I’m humming it in the shower.

The rest of the album not only fails to reach the heights of “The Overload”, but it fails to even be a good addition to the ever-growing post-punk genre. Yard Act certainly got a lot of hype, which is why it landed on my radar in the first place, but nearly the entirety of this record is a soulless carbon copy of its influences. I hear smatterings of the Fall, LCD Soundsystem, Sleaford Mods, Arctic Monkeys, and others, without a trace of a singular identity. That in of itself is bad enough, but the record displays a rather unearned, boastful presentation that I cannot stand here and abide. Not at all. If even half the tracks hit hard like “The Overload”, I’d be whistling a different tune! But when you get tracks like “Rich” that plods along on its one-trick-pony snail’s pace, or tracks like “Quarantine the Sticks” that attempts to be more profound and satirical than the thimbleful of substance allows, it’s hard not to feel a little cheated. Even while the title track completely blew me away, I was still annoyed that the very first track on a band’s very first album had a bridge where the singer breaks down what it’s like to make it in the music business. Even if it is self-deprecating, it smacks of acting above one’s station. Save that shit for album four or five.

This record disappointed me greatly, and I still haven’t yet forgiven it.

Early Verdict:

Punch Brothers – Hell on Church Street
(January 14, 2022)

I’ve already said a lot with the other two, luckily I don’t have too much to say with Punch Brothers. They take a genuinely uncool genre like bluegrass and make it palatable for modern indie audiences. They do what they do and they do it well.

Hell on Church Street, their sixth studio album, is a track-by-track reworking of bluegrass musician Tony Rice’s 1983 album Church Street Blues. I don’t know anything about Tony Rice, where he fits into the history of American bluegrass traditions, or even how quintessential his album was to bluegrass as a whole, but guitarist Chris Eldridge was a student of Rice’s and saw fit to bring the band together to record this tribute. Rice died on Christmas, 2020.

You get a good mix of, what I imagine, all of the varying bluegrass styles. A bubbly traditional folk instrumental “Cattle in the Cane”. A peaceful instrumental “Gold Rush”. A jaunty, hillbilly romp “Any Old Time”. A baleful vocal lament “Streets of London”. A sad, fiery tale of lost love “House Carpenter”. Bob Dylan and Gordon Lightfoot covers “One More Night” and “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”, respectively, performed with all the heart you’d expect from the real deals. It’s good. It’s all good.

I’ve given this band a shot about ten years ago, and the experience resulted in my complete ambivalence. I even saw them live, which I can’t say about many bands at all, and was left completely cold. Maybe I’m older and more open-minded, because Hell on Church Street is a damn fine record. These players are all fantastic musicians and vocalists, and I’ll still be spinning this one once in a while. I might even check out Tony Rice. Maybe.

Early Verdict: