Sounds | Vandoliers, Waiting On A Train
- Vincent Willems
- 18 apr 2021
- 3 minuten om te lezen
De melodie zal net zoals het liedje de rest van de dag door m'n hoofd dwalen, wat meteen het startschot is om repeat nogmaals in te drukken. Een zeer melodieuze country/blues/rock song, gesterkt door viool en mondharmonica. Deze zeskoppige band levert met Waiting On A Train een kleurrijke Texas countrysound.
luister ook naar: Every Saturday Night
Lees
Vandoliers are the next wave of Texas music. The six-piece Dallas-Fort Worth group channels all that makes this vast state unique: tradition, modernity, audacity, grit, andāof courseāsize. Forever puts it all together for an enthralling ride down a fresh Lone Star highway. Produced and recorded by Adam Hill (Low Cut Connie, The Bo-Keys, Deer Tick, Don Bryant, Zeshan B) at American Recording Studios in Memphis, TN, the bandās third album (and first with Bloodshot) Forever is a mix of youthful and defiant punk, rugged Red Dirt country, and vibrant Tejano. The full-lengthās 10 songs blend emblematic rock ānā roll with bold horns, violin, and a slather of twang reflecting where the band is from, where theyāve been and, eventually, where theyāll be headed. Itās regional and universal all the same. āI wrote a series of songs about my life and gave it to the best musicians I know to flesh out,ā says lead singer and guitarist Joshua Fleming. āI spent over a year writing by myself, with friends and mentors, and we spent just as long filling out arrangements and writing scores. We wrote horn and fiddle parts on a trio tour through the mountains of New Mexico, Wyoming and Montana.ā One of those mentors is fellow Dallas-Fort Worth musician Rhett Miller of Old 97ās. The influence and tutelage of Miller and his bandmates helped sharpen Vandoliersā Texas-bred, roots-based punk rock. āBefore the band started diving into the new material, I sent Rhett a bunch of acoustic phone demos,ā says Fleming. āBeing the amazing person he is, he sent me back a 3,000-word email of advice that read like a master class in the art of songwriting. Beyond their influence musically, theyāve really taken us under their wing, letting us play shows with them and giving us all kinds of advice along the way.ā While tracking alongside the muddy path that country-punk bands like Old 97ās, Jason and the Scorchers, and the True Believers blazed in the ā80s and ā90s, Vandoliers define their own style; no one else is upending the genre quite like them. There are familiar ingredientsāFlemingās raspy vocals, rousing sing-along choruses, and an infectious energy (like on the rippinā āSixteen Yearsā)āthat lay down the foundation on Forever. But itās the ancillary instrumentation that separates them from others. When they seamlessly inject punk rock with ā60 and ā70s country grime (āTumbleweedā), old-timey fiddlinā (āMiles and Milesā), Tex-Mex horn and violin (āFallen Againā), and heartfelt balladry (āCigarettes in the Rainā), a rich new sound emerges. References to the Texas Tornados, Social Distortion, Deer Tick, and Calexico can be made, but none fully capture the soul of the self-proclaimed āConverse cowboys.ā For a band that spends more than half the year on the road, āforeverā is their credo of hope and determinationāāVFFVā (Vandoliers Forever, Forever Vandoliers) is tattooed on the six membersā arms as an emblem of their solidarity and commitment to the collective, through good times and, more significantly, the tough ones. The albumās lyrics center on themes of dedication (āSixteen Yearsā), being known as middle finger-throwing rabble rousers (āTroublemakerā), seizing adventure while traveling (āNowhere Fastā), and addressing anxiety and depression (āFallen Againā). When they return home from tour, broke and empty, they humbly look to their families for support (āBottom Dollar Boyā), and unconditional loveādespite their unconventional career pathsā(āTumbleweedā). Thus recharged, they can hit the road again, to spread the Vandoliersā message with renewed fervor. Formed in 2015, Vandoliers are Fleming, bassist Mark Moncrieff, drummer Guyton Sanders, fiddler Travis Curry, electric guitarist Dustin Fleming, and multi-instrumentalist Cory Graves. Their first two albums Ameri-Kinda (2016) and The Native (2017) were released on State Fair Records.
