Mistletone

Artwork by Bjenny Montero

WOODEN SHJIPS TOUR DATES:

SYDNEY: SAT MAR 24 @ Oxford Art Factory w/- The Laurels + DCM. Tickets on sale now through Moshtix.
BRISBANE: SUN MAR 25 @ The Zoo w/- Secret Birds + Nite Fields. Tickets on sale now through Oztix.
MELBOURNE: WED MAR 28 @ The Corner w/ Beaches + Forces. Tickets on sale now through the venue.
PERTH: FRI MAR 30 @ The Bakery w/- Mental Powers and French Rockets. Tickets on sale now through Oztix.

“Wooden Shjips combine and update the transportative force of the Velvet Underground’s no-blues drone, Can’s unrelenting pulse and the holy garage-rock fire of the 13th Floor Elevators into a compact, wrapped-in-reverb trip of vintage transcendence and forward thrust.” – DAVID FRICKE (ROLLING STONE)

San Francisco trance-rock quartet WOODEN SHJIPS return to our shores, bringing back their trance-inducing, desert-fried, maximum-volume rock ‘n’ roll. While indebted to the psych music of the ‘60s and mid-‘70s, electric Neil Young, and even the induced travels of Spacemen 3, the Shjips’ music is in every way their own. Earlier this year, Wooden Shjips unleashed West, a brand new LP packed full of visceral, forbidding rock, on Thrill Jockey with a local release on Fuse. On that LP and in their live shows, the Shjips draw power through stretching-to-infinity repetition and their ability to turn crunchy 1970s boogie-rock into isolation-chamber space-out fare. This one is going to be good folks, bring your earplugs and your Visine.

The experience of Wooden Shjips has been equated to that of the Japanese phenomenon called maboroshi, which is somewhat similar to seeing a mirage or hallucinating in time. In the context of imagination/dreams, maboroshi is attributed to past occurrences and can take on a meaning like “phantoms.” The group’s songs seem to exist in a dream state in which anything is possible.

Wooden Shjips, as they are today, started in 2006. The band self released a 10″ and 7″ that year and started playing shows shortly thereafter. Prior to 2006, Wooden Shjips was an experiment in primitive and minimalist rock. After it imploded, Ripley Johnson, guitar and vocals, assembled the current lineup of Dusty Jermier on bass, Nash Whalen on organ, and Omar Ahsanuddin on drums.

West marks the first time the band recorded in a proper studio, as well as the first time with an engineer (Phil Manley). All previous recordings, either self-released, for Holy Mountain, or Mexican Summer were done more piecemeal in the band’s rehearsal studio. West was recorded and mixed in six days at Lucky Cat Studios in San Francisco. It was mastered by Sonic Boom at Blanker Unisinn, Brooklyn, with additional mastering by Heba Kadry at the Lodge in New York.

The over riding theme for the album (as indicated by the title) is the American West, and all of the mythology, romanticism, and idealism that it embodies. The band members grew up on the East Coast, so for a long time the history and literature of the West was an abstraction and a fascination for them.

Part of the allure of the West, which is part of the myth, is the concept of Manifest Destiny, the vastness, and the possibilities for reinvention, which is not to say that is what each song is specifically about, but it was very much an undercurrent during the songwriting of the album. The artwork also touches on the same theme by using an iconic structure that is both a gateway in a literal and metaphorical sense.

It is easy to see why these would appeal to Wooden Shjips, as their music lends itself to exploration. It is both transformative and transporting, the sum being far greater than it’s parts. The steady driving rhythms are the elliptical motion machine driven by the often thick and distorted guitar lines, melodic and boundless. Where they may lead cannot be anticipated but following them is exhilarating. It is all about getting there, the destination, while the experience of getting there is an adventure.

It is the guitar lines that guide both the listener and the band on the literal and metaphorical journey into the vastness. The ghostly vocals, obscured by dense layers of instruments surrounding them, are alluring with their airy mystery. This elusive quality further draws the listener in, while they attempt to grasp at their meaning. West is an epic journey to the edge and beyond.

Video: Crossing (live)

“Most of the songs on the album West are thematically linked to the romantic idea of the American west, or what that means to us as a band,” says Wooden Shjips’ frontman and guitarist Ripley Johnson (returning  to the Shjips fold after flitting around the world with Moon Duo, most recently in Australia for Sound Summit). “For Crossing, that is represented in images of epic road trips and losing oneself in the rhythm of the road. It’s existentialism as transport, both physically and spiritually, literally and metaphorically.”