War on Drugs

I'm starting to hear Baby Missiles on satellite radio. In a better world it would be a hit.

This has catapulted directly to my top ten of the year, I love it.

it's excellent--totally lives up to the promise of the debut.

Here's where I admit I haven't heard the debut yet. I kind of didn't get into these guys until I got into Kurt Vile last year. I need to check it out.

Don't know anything about these guys but the premise is intruiging.

haven't heard the debut yet.

The debut has 2 of their very best songs, Arms Like Boulders and Taking The Farm, which is still my favorite.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ki4xBXucjSQ

This is great!

agree with jon, working its way to my tops of 2011

The EP > new one > Wagonwheel

IMHO

Seeing them tomorrow night! Delayed a plane trip to do so. Psyched. Will report back.

Nah, I think the new one is better than the EP, if only because its sequenced so well. It just really flows and holds together in a way that makes it really hard not to just cherry pick tunes from it to hear. Wherever I start, I just end up listening to the rest of the album until it ends.

http://alteredzones.com/posts/1876/war-drugs-prep-expanded-slave-ambient-cs/

"To allow the group's experimental tendencies more breathing room, Slave Ambient is receiving a complementary second release in the coming weeks on (appropriately) shiny red cassette. Side 2 features six new freeform movements that strip away the bombast, revealing the sonic aquifer of fluid drones, synth explorations, and celestial textures that flows underneath. Version one of Slave Ambient was made for speeding down the road windows down; the cassette version was made for the long ascent up the space elevator".

awesome, thanks for the heads up!

this record might be even better than Smoke Ring For My Halo, which is a real achievement and a challenge to top for their (and Vile) next record.

this album fits nicely amidst blue collar punk S/D (bouncing souls etc) and Post-Boss American Shades of Working Class Rock Music Thread type stuff imho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMqWSFNC1jU

lol @ Produced by Urban Outfitters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErQH5-1ot4w

otm

saw these guys on sunday -- pretty solid show, though having purling hiss as your opener is going to make even the greatest band sound a little bit sluggish.

My copy of the tape mentioned upthread finally arrived today. Looking forward to hearing Side 2...

new track sounds familiar but still good
"taking the farm" from the debut is still my favorite

I hope this record is good because it bumped a bunch of my recording sessions

http://m.soundcloud.com/secretlycanadian/the-war-on-drugs-red-eyes/

Good news!souns great! Like Slave Ambient part two but that's fine with me.

Is it Adam ob the cover of the record?
So is War On Drugs just a moniker of his name?

I guess so...I always liked to think of them as a band but maybe it's just Adam.

Did Kurt Vile used to play with these guys? Anyone know what tracks/record specifically?

Kurt Vile used to be in the band, the wikipedia entry is pretty good as far as what his contributions were.

Very often I cannot tell these guys apart - although KV stresses the stoner ennui a bit more, while War on Drugs have a bit of a Springsteen thingy.
Anyway, although Slave Ambient was one of my favourite records of these past 5 years, I'm not really sure whether I need another album from these guys.

Youre last sentence makes no sense

Love this band's songwriting, but I wish they'd change their production style. The gauzy atmospherics doesn't do their songs justice.

xp - really? You've never had that feeling where you love an album but don't need to hear anything more from that band?

Without the gauzy atmospherics they'd basically just be Kurt Vile mk II and who wants that?

agreed - the gauze is the main draw, hence why Slave Ambient >> first lp

Like, other than Baby Missiles, I'm not sure "songwriting" is one of their main strengths at all.

The first and last song presents great song wriying as well

this album is so fucking rad

meaning the new one

New album is just brilliant. So warm and comforting, even though it's pretty miserable. As if Springsteen and the E Street Band had made an album with Mark Knopfler in between BITUSA and ToL, but all concerned happened to have been listening only to Neu at the time.

Can't wait to hear this. 'Slave Ambient' was a big record for me.

Interesting you mention Knopfler as Dylan's 'Series of Dreams' (which he plays on) sounds like the prerequisite for War on Drugs.

Yeah excited as well - so this is Slave Ambient II, I gather (not a bad thing)?

More like he realised Tiny Missiles was the best song on Slave Ambient and based the album around that … Lots of lazy Knopfler lead guitar lines all over it.

Oooh, that sounds great. Definitely ready for a new album by these guys

it is much more minimalistic than Baby Missiles.
it's good, though Slave Ambient had more hooks. this one seems a little unfocused maybe.

BTW, i see more Springsteen doing 80's Sophisti-pop than Dire STRaits

The single is fantastic, if it's all in that vein I am 100% down with this project.

it's not all rippers but the ones like "red eye" are all killer

I mean I really, really like Slave Ambient as well so I'm happy with some balance here.

i won't be surprised if they like Destroyer's Kaputt.

i discovered the war on drugs because they opened up for destroyer on the kaputt tour, thought they sounded like a rad space rock tom petty or something

the sequencing on this album reminds me of their live show in that they got the bangers out of the way at the beginning and then just let the jam ride for the rest

"rad space rock tom petty " is exactly how I describe this band to people

xpost yeah this take on “I don’t live here anymore” grooves hard