SFist Reviews Wolfmother at the Fillmore

SFist Jon: Ah yeah, the guitar thing. While I agree he wasn't that great of a lead guitar player-- he was much stronger on the riffing-- you also have to allow the fact that Wolfmother is still very much a baby band. Unless we're talking some sort of Eddie Van Halen idiot savant, twenty-one year olds can oftentimes be rather amateurish on that end. Give the band a year or two and some more hard-core touring and then see what they sound like. They definitely have potential to be the kind of band that plays a two-hour set made up of only eight songs, one of them being a twenty-minute "Train Kept A-Rolling/Communication Breakdown" throw-down. Just as long as they stay away from drum solos or four piece suites on snow dogs or the collected works of Samuel Coleridge they'll be okay. And I think we both agree that they have definite Zep II potential on their next album, you know the take-it-the-next level disc that mixes a little hard core heaviness with some great mellow stuff with all sorts of cool sounds thrown in for good measure. They also have the potential to be majorly stoney too. Some of the moments during the concert made you smell the bongwater.

Now onto the opening bands. I have to admit Silversun was a disappointment. I love "Lazy Eye" and I love their whole early Smashing Pumpkins thing down to the lanky singer and female bassist, but their songs aren't quite there yet. Which is a shame because early, Gish era Pumpkins hits the sweet spot like nobody's business. All the songs kind of sounded the same, groovy bass lines into heavier choruses but there was no variance there. And while they have a great sound, the sound is all a little constricting, especially when all the songs sound the same. Still, I do love the sound and the sort of noisy mayhem they went into at the end of “Lazy Eye” shows that they have potential. The band has the potential to fly and soar around and be BIG but they're still a little too earth-bound as a band. As for Simon Dawes, we both agreed that they were little schizo-- part skinny tie and part long hair. The songs all had quirky lyrics and melodies but then they'd bust out some big anthemic, epic song complete with scorching guitar solos. And both of us noticed that the guitar player (long haired type) and singer (skinny tie type) looked completely bored while the other one did their thing. The bassist who had hair down to his shoulders looked to be in a completely different band entirely and he was so bored at one point he sat down. Still, they were really, really tight and their drummer was stupendous. Same with Silversun's drumming by the way.

SFist Chris: Huh? What'd you say SFist Jon? I think my ears are still bleeding. I know my perma-grin is still raging. What a show. For people that like to f***ing rawk and who love the idea of bone-crunching, sustained, crisp yet crackling, tight power chords, the Mother of Wolves is the real deal.

Back in high school in SoCal in the mid-eighties, there was bascially a pitched battle on campus between the rockers and the mods. I was a rocker because guitar chords, bass, and drums move me, not some lame-ass emotitive poetry that should be rotting away in the dusty notebook of some unfulfilled drama geek -- are you listening to me ColdPlay?

Wolfmother could be this generation's answer for rockers looking to take back the rock. First off, they're a power trio. Nothing says "we're here to rip it up" like a power trio. Sure, there were times when I found myself wishing they had a really shredding lead guitarist to send the whole thing over the top, but lead singer Andrew Stockdale can play the hell out of the power chords and main riffs, so it's not like they don't have enough guitar sound. Stockdale is no Jimmy Page though, so I do think a lead guitarist is somewhere in the band's future, especially if they want to follow their Zeppelin-lust into rock immortality.

And you know this band is going to bring the crunch when the top musical influence listed on their MySpace page is Animal and the Muppet Band. ANIMAL!!!!

Man does Stockdale have some pipes. I keep hearing all these comparisons to Sabbath, but his voice most closely sounds like Geddy Lee of Rush to me (in a good way). When bassist Chris Ross starts attacking his keyboards -- an aside here: as I mentioned earlier, I am rabidly rocker in my musical orientation, and as such, have an inherent disdain for most keyboarding. However, Ross plays the keyboards with ferocity, abusing every prissy key and pulling sounds out of that instrument that I haven't heard since Machine Head. He abused it, dry humped it, stomped it, and looked like a latter-day Keith Moon-whirling dervish as he filled the stage with booming bass lines and tripped-out, funky leads. Anyway, with the keyboards going, this band sounds more like Deep Purple than Sabbath. It's not like you could go wrong either way there.

The drumming was, eh. The drummer for Simon Dawes, the first band last night was the best drummer of the night, pulling some amazing beats and deep sounds from just a tiny five-piece set. Wolf drummer Myles Heskett is fine, but we've heard better. Not complaining though.

Image from Undercover.com

SFist Jon: Let's just say I haven't been as excited for a show in years. See, I've got this theory going that there are two kinds of rock bands: skinny tie bands and long hair bands. It’s kind of a variation of the mod/rockers thing but updated. Skinny tie bands play songs meant for people to dance too, with an emphasis on quirkiness and witty lyrics as well as musicianship. They usually play Fenders. Long hair bands play songs meant to rock out too and to feel. They emphasize riffs over lyrics, rocking over quirkiness and most of them know only eight chords but they play them really, really loudly. Long hair bands play Gibsons. The thing is that this decade has mainly been the decade of the skinny tie bands-- the Strokes, the Killers, Franz Ferdinand, hell even the White Stripes and Death Cab for Cutie-- while the long hair bands have been mainly in the shadows. Wolfmother, or as I like to call them, Wolf F----- Mother is a full-on long hair band. The first time I heard them was while listening to Live 105's morning show one morning when they played "Woman" and there was a long discussion as to whether or not the band was too Black Sabbath-y. Needless to say, I downloaded the disc that night and it's been love ever since. Besides the fact it's a great album and kicks all sorts of ass, the album has a potential to do something of utmost importance, bring the rock back to rock. Not rock, actually, but RAWK.

Let's just say we weren't disappointed. The moment the band took the stage and we saw the guitarist/singer sporting 'chops and a Jewfro straight out of the Jimi Hendrix Experience circa 1967 and that the bassist was smoking a cigarette as he walked on we knew this was going to be good. Then when it became obvious that the bass player was way beyond drunk, well, let's just say for those about to rock, we salute you.

As for the show, it lived up to the expectations-- one of the most fun shows I've seen in awhile. The band did bring the rock: bone crunching power chords on top of riff-laden grooves. Even a little jamming here and there for good measure. And my God, the bassist. He'd throw down bass chords to help power up the riffs but he was at his best playing this organ they had set up that was built to be thrown all over the place. He'd scrunch over the organ and hop up and down like a monkey while playing or throw the thing on it's side or rock it back and forth while throwing down like Deep Purple at it's Purple-ist (not an -ist site, actually) best. For the final song, he laid the thing down on it's side and laid down next to it, playing whatever he was playing while lying on his back. It was awesome. And did we mention how messed up he looked? As for the guitarist/singer, he's got a great Gedde Lee meets Ozzy voice and while he's not a great soloist, he's got a wicked, nasty little sound. And you gotta like any guitarist who throws down a leap off the drum riser followed by a leg kick and then a full 360 spin all within a minute.

As for the highlights: the always groovy Love Train, an extended "Woman," a monsterous "Collusus" and a locked in "Joker." Actually, my favorite moment was "White Unicorn.” It was the song that dropped down for a bit of a space jam and built up to a climax before going back into the chorus. It was the song the guitarist jumped off the riser for. It was so tight half the audience leaped with him, completely beholden to the music.

Great show.