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The debut offering from the Whiskey Priest, Wave and Cloud, is an album for the patient and penitent. It’s slowly developing folk, established from the start with the over nine-minute long “A Seafarer’s Lament,” which crawls through an ambient backdrop left lingering and lost at sea. The project of Seth Woods (Sad Accordions; Zookeeper; Alex Dupree and the Trapdoor Band), the Whiskey Priest seems torn between impulses, which may account for his moniker. Pulling with a minimalist lull through the first five songs on the album – a murky drawl spun over gently repetitive guitar lines – the album finally jumps with some energy and excitement by the second half of the nearly hour long LP. Woods manages both aspects of his songwriting tendencies well, but they are also incongruous as presented, a problem of more overall pacing and tracklisting that distracts from the quality of the songs rather than enhancing it.
“A Seafarer’s Lament” sets the odd imbalance that takes several songs to recover from. The song itself is weary and haunting, Woods wringing a moaning wail out atop the atmospherics to an effect of being almost lost and delirious upon the blank expanse of ocean. In and of itself, the tune works well enough, but as the opening track, it feels as if the listener must earn their way into what follows rather than having their attention captured and wanting to move forward. The effect is most clear on the following “If a Train was a Doctor was a Song,” a yearning strummer that still can’t pick itself up from the placid pace of the opener or the following “Uncalled.” Likewise, “Winter Window”, despite Woods’ stretching to a higher vocal range and the sparse chimes in the background, feels heavier than it sounds, and the more upbeat acoustic but still hypnotically droned “The Way of the Future” can’t quite break out of the mold.
This all changes with the banjo and handclapping/footstomping romp of “No Man is an Island (But Me),” (mp3 below) which literally comes through like a revival here. The scattershot percussion and more slightly more full arrangement on “Winter Secret Army Blood” similarly perks Wood’s more deliberate pleading so that when the more stripped down title track emerges, its looped ambiance and repetition feels balanced and beautiful as it was meant to. “Real Good” doesn’t feel quite fully developed, but is some Wood’s best lyricism and the chorus strikes a nice tone, if overall a bit too short.
Closing out with “All the Way Back”, which begs to explode into a singalong, the excellent mournful yet exuberant balance of “Careless”, and the six-and-a-half minute capstone “Love Me Like a Holy War,” Woods offers up the full array of Whiskey Priest. The last song, especially, may be among the best on the album, with Woods finally finding the knack to balance its epic inclinations while keeping the listener engaged through the entire song.
There are plenty of moments on Wave and Cloud that warrant Woods’ solo pursuit beyond his myriad of other projects. The ineffective elements are those of the album as a whole, not the artist – the sequencing is a large part of the problem, but also that 13 musicians (including Woods) are listed as contributing to the work, yet they rarely make their presence felt. Perhaps given the time to more fully develop the songs and album, the Whiskey Priest could present a stellar album in the future. Wave and Cloud certainly suggests as much, even in its torn ambitions.
Mp3 from Wave and Cloud:
No Man is an Island (But Me)
Website:
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