War on Drugs

[dad]

i still really love slave ambient and future weather, guys.

not sorry about that.

[dad]

been playing a lot of the back catalog stuff, and i love, love, love, comin' through. my only complaint is i feel like it ends too soon. i want them to jam it out a little.

do they extend it some when they play it live? do they play it much?

I agree, Comin Through might be their best song. Yes they do (or did) play it live semi-frequently. When I saw them on the Lost in the Dream tour, they played it and it was disappointing. But I don't know if my judgement is fair. He sang it with a completely different vocal tempo, and I love the studio version so much I was biased against any alterations! I don't remember if they extended it.

the end of Comin' Though sounds like it should go right into Baby Missiles.

[Strat]

Change

Geezes.

I just absolutely love his phrasing. And melody. And the little intricacies of the instruments that pop through.

[epilogue]

This a really solid record. I'm looking forward to spending more time with it. Seems like the kind of thing that opens up.

[dad]

i can't stop listening to slave ambient and future weather, guys.

mostly future weather.

[Chris_H_2]

This a really solid record. I'm looking forward to spending more time with it. Seems like the kind of thing that opens up.

welcome aboard joe.

[epilogue]

This a really solid record. I'm looking forward to spending more time with it. Seems like the kind of thing that opens up.

welcome aboard joe.

[Farmer John]

4 of my Spotify Top 5 songs this year were from LIVE DRUGS.

[ghost]

Just noticed, the keyboard riff from IDLHA sure sounds like the one from Our Lips Are Sealed.

[Matters]

Really like the new one. Much more enjoyable for me then A Deeper Understanding. The run of tracks 2-7 is really great. I doubt they will ever top LITD or SA but this ranks with those two.
Here’s my current TWOD playlist:

Under the Pressure
Harmonia’s Dream
Red Eyes
I was There
Pain
Brothers
An Ocean…
I Don’t Wanna Wait
Disappearing
Love is Calling…
The Animator
Come to the City
Coming’ Through
Victim
Pile of Tires
I Don’t Live Here…
It’s Your Destiny
A Needle in Your Eye…

For me this list ranks up with any artist’s top shelf, ever. Currently, they are the best band on earth.

[liebzz]

Really like the new one. Much more enjoyable for me then A Deeper Understanding. The run of tracks 2-7 is really great. I doubt they will ever top LITD or SA but this ranks with those two.
Here’s my current TWOD playlist:

Under the Pressure
Harmonia’s Dream
Red Eyes
I was There
Pain
Brothers
An Ocean…
I Don’t Wanna Wait
Disappearing
Love is Calling…
The Animator
Come to the City
Coming’ Through
Victim
Pile of Tires
I Don’t Live Here…
It’s Your Destiny
A Needle in Your Eye…

For me this list ranks up with any artist’s top shelf, ever. Currently, they are the best band on earth.

I have been listening to this a lot lately, but I am not sure I would go that far. Certainly excellent and considering their show next month at MSG. Same weekend as my son’s birthday so probably won’t happen.

[liebzz]

Alright, I meant to do this last year. The War on Drugs journey!! I Don’t Live Here Anymore was one of my favorites from 2021, and I kept starting to go back but kept getting distracted. Will start with the Barrel of Batteries EP…

[liebzz]

Barrel of Batteries EP

While this largely feels like a opening salvo to highlight Arms Like Boulders, one beast of a track, Pushing Corn has a way of building so you are sort of building interest with it. However, outside Arms Like Boulders, Buenos Aires Beach is a killer song that recalls the Velvet Underground in the interplay between drums and guitars, but has a buoyancy to it rather than a mind bending psychedelia to its repeated rhythms. Outstanding start.

[liebzz]

Wagonwheel Blues

Picking up where the short EP left off, this full length debut touches on much of what I laid out in the last review - this seems almost again like the Velvet Underground if only Springsteen and Dylan got a hold of the band instead. Arms Like Boulders and Buenos Aires Beach are still big highlights, but joined here by Taking the Farm, the psychedelic swirl of There Is No Urgency, the pick-me-up like A Needle In Your Eye #16, and the epic very VU-esque Show Me the Coast. That on their first album they threw instrumental tracks in some key spots (always thought that the third song on an album was always of big importance, like the power hitter in a baseball lineup) shows a band willing to push right out the gates. This version of the War on Drugs does barely resemble what’s to come later, likely due to this album being a collaboration with Kurt Vile who would be soon on to his solo career. This is a definite solid A album, worthy of the predecessors name checked here.

[liebzz]

Future Weather EP

Much like the Barrel of Batteries EP, this EP immediately precedes the next album and contains a few tracks from it. The sound takes a big shift without Kurt Vile in the folder, leaning more into the classic rock roots to me. Baby Missiles could very well be a Springsteen song and it wouldn’t have shocked me. Comin’ Through and Brothers are both representative to me of what I would expect from the War on Drugs based on my limited experience, but both are quite solid. A Pile of Tires almost sounds like My Morning Jacket in its infancy - folk rock drenched in vocal reverb, but this feels their own nonetheless. They close this with The History of Plastic, the sole long epic here that draws from some sonic experimentation to deliver yet more consistently excellent material to devour. Looking forward to the next full album.

[dad]

Future Weather EP

Much like the Barrel of Batteries EP, this EP immediately precedes the next album and contains a few tracks from it. The sound takes a big shift without Kurt Vile in the folder, leaning more into the classic rock roots to me. Baby Missiles could very well be a Springsteen song and it wouldn’t have shocked me. Comin’ Through and Brothers are both representative to me of what I would expect from the War on Drugs based on my limited experience, but both are quite solid. A Pile of Tires almost sounds like My Morning Jacket in its infancy - folk rock drenched in vocal reverb, but this feels their own nonetheless. They close this with The History of Plastic, the sole long epic here that draws from some sonic experimentation to deliver yet more consistently excellent material to devour. Looking forward to the next full album.

I love Future Weather so much.

[liebzz]

Slave Ambient

Unsurprisingly, Slave Ambient and Future Weather are natural companions, sharing a couple of songs and maintaining a consistent vibe where a head in the clouds atmosphere mixes with classic rock. Suffice it to say I could drop a number more classic bands and albums that I can hear in there, but ultimately that probably doesn’t serve a work they make their own. If the 2000’s indie sound could be perfected and bottled up, this feels like that. Best Night, Brothers, I Was There, Your Love Is Calling My Name, the U2 meets hazy Come to the City, and Baby Missiles all made me quite happy, but it seems they saved one of the best for last, as Black Water Falls progresses into a great finish. Killer album here.

[liebzz]

Lost in the Dream

As if by divine rock n roll providence on third albums, The War on Drugs arrive with an album that seems to put it all together. With a sound rooted in what they started but pushing more into something of an 80s groove without losing sight of moving forward, this album absolutely kills from from front to back. Under the Pressure, Red Eyes, Suffering, An Ocean In Between the Waves, Eyes to the Wind and Burning all feel immediately like classic songs that could have existed for decades and still been classic. What sets them apart here, and perhaps what could gnaw at some people, is that these songs all take their time to develop, gaining steam until they crest, and while I don’t think you need patience necessarily to get there, the journey seems as enjoyable as the pay off. What happens here though is that each song gets its own moment and becomes a highlight - even the songs I didn’t just list (you know, in case you are ready to respond that Disappearing, Lost in the Dream or In Reverse is your favorite - I get it on each track). If the first two were solid A albums, this reaches A+ territory.

[liebzz]

A Deeper Understanding

On first listen, this album feels like the logical extension of Lost in the Dream. Once again, the War on Drugs give lots and lots of space to this songs, allowing the songs to play themselves out and take you to different places, which often fully reveal themselves in the last couple of minutes. This seems a bit more laboring on this one than the last, but still a joy to hear a band comfortable enough in their skin to allow a song like Thinking of a Place to take 11 minutes to fully make its point. In Chains follows and is a quick shot in comparison but a big highlight for me, along with especially the first half of this album, which seemed near perfect (Up All Night through Knocked Down just seemed particularly great). Once again another very impressive album from these folks.

[Chris_H_2]

Great synopses. Keep them coming.

I’m still in the minority that prefers a Deeper Understanding to Lost In A Dream.