Nov

20

Willowz: New Album ‘Everyone’ Is for Everyone

Filed Under Updates 

MP3: Willowz – “Repetition”
MP3: Willowz – “Everyone”

thewillowz“I think as far as the songs go, they’re the best songs we’ve ever written—I think it’s our best record in all ways,” asserts frontman Richie Follin in regard to Everyone, the latest offering from his band, The Willowz. Having been an attentive fan through the last eight years, I would have to agree. That The Willowz were having their almost impromptu record release party at a NY dive called Home Sweet Home is probably just a coincidence, but all the same, I couldn’t let the irony go unnoticed. The Willowz, who have always been known as a California band, hailing from Orange County, have, in the last year or so, ‘settled’ themselves down in New York, where Richie’s mom lives, where they recorded their previous album, and where plane tickets to go to Europe for a tour are a hell of a lot cheaper. I guess their first record release party in NYC kind of puts the final stamp on The Willowz’new status as a New York band.

Everyone sounds completely different than any other Willowz record, and it ought to—because it is. “It’s the first time we’ve gone to a studio and worked with a Grammy-award-winning producer,” Richie is quick to point out. Aside from some pre-production, Everyone was recorded at Elmwood Studios in Dallas by Stuart Sikes, who has worked on records by Cat Power, The White Stripes, The Walkmen, Modest Mouse, and Loretta Lynn. “The way I pictured the songs sounding in my head—I think Stuart was like the one guy who could get them to sound like that.” Sikes contacted The Willowz after seeing them in Dallas, saying “it was one of the best shows he’d seen all year.” On their previous three albums, The Willowz took recording and producing duties upon themselves, which, as Richie admits, has its pros and cons—the biggest con probably being a lack of discipline. “This is the first time we ever had lyrics for all the songs and we had practiced them like hundreds of times, actually singing them with all the different parts, whereas before, half the songs were being written while we were there. We didn’t come in with all the lyrics because we were doing them on our own. So [now] we kind of had that inconvenience when we were paying for it…we had to have our shit down for this, and I think it paid off. I think that’s the way you’re supposed to do it.” The psychedelic, meandering, white noise-drenched Willowz of yesterday have grown into a bolder, punchier, purpose-driven band—more focused, and still, somehow, more fun. Sikes’ production leaves some open space, room to breathe, and it gives a sense of the epic to The Willowz’ sound, previously unheard. Richie’s vocal quality in album opener ‘Break Your Back’ could convince you he’s a real rock n’ roll veteran when he sings, “Break your back on this world. Have some fun on your way. Don’t you know? No one can stay.” The reflective horn and moog-infused ‘No Heroes’ might lead you to think they had become apathetic and jaded, but in songs like “Twenty Five,” the fierce garage punk track that makes for a perfect post-grad anthem, Richie muses, “I’m just twenty-five. I want to be alive. I ain’t educated but I ain’t no fool—just trying to teach you that there ain’t no rules,” a stark reminder that The Willowz aren’t getting old yet. With albums on Posh Boy, Sympathy for the Record Industry, and Dim Mak behind them; with their songs featured in 2 Michel Gondry films (Eternal Sunshine… and The Science of Sleep) behind them; and with their last record making Rolling Stone’s Top 50 Albums List behind them, they’re just getting started…again.

“The other thing is [that] half the band is new. That gave it a whole new vibe, and I think we wanted to get back to what we were originally doing. We kind of strayed on our last record and I think this record is maybe the most contemporary record we’ve ever done.” Actually, every Willowz album has had a change in the lineup. Richie and Jessica Reynoza (bass and occasional vocals), the founding members, have always remained, but drummer Loren Humphrey has only been in the band for the last two years. The Willowz asked guitarist William Mclaren (who was originally supposed to be in Vampire Weekend until they decided on the Columbia-grad shtick) to join the band maybe a year and a half ago. “He came to our house in LA to record his record with Loren [who he grew up with] and he played ‘What’s Wrong is Right’ from Talk in Circles—he was just messing around and I was like, ‘Wow, that sounds so much better than I could ever play it’…and then it was always kind of in the back of my mind and then we just asked him to join…Will listens to much different stuff than the rest of the band listens to and I think that had an impact on [our new album].” As a side note, former Willowz second guitarist Aric now plays in The Icarus Line, who were out here for CMJ not too long ago, if I’m not mistaken.

Even though the physical copies of Everyone are unavailable until the middle of next month and the album was digitally pre-released just this past Tuesday, Richie says The Willowz are already “working on the new record and I think we’re going to try to get [David] Fridmann (who has produced for The Flaming Lips, Sleater-Kinney, Mercury Rev, and Low) to mix it.” When I asked Richie if there was any particular reason they named the album Everyone, he answered, “Hopefully it’s for everyone. They’re pop songs. I think [on] our previous records, they’re kind of pop songs but maybe the way I was singing them appeared annoying to some people…I think we are trying to focus more on what we were doing when we first started.”

Included in this post are The Willowz’ new single, ‘Repetition,’ as well as the title track from the new album. As stated above, the record is available digitally on itunes, lala, and amazon now, but the physical copies won’t be out until mid-December. If you’re still a skeptic, you can check out some additional tracks from Everyone at www.thewillowz.bandcamp.com

Nathan Asher lives in New York, where he works for an educational research firm and scours the City for good espresso. He has an appreciation for old and curious things, and he likes his music loud: www.myfloatinghome.wordpress.com

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