The Joy Formidable have several factors working strongly in their favor:
1) They have a terrific band name.
2) They are Welsh (me too, kind of!)
3) They just put out an Album, Wolf’s Law, that is achingly good from start to finish.
Though I was aware of the band’s aptly named 2011 debut The Big Roar, the wall-of-sound, hard driving guitar tunes didn’t strike quite the right note for me and I relegated The Joy Formidable to my own mental lower tier. Thankfully Wolf’s Law takes everything about the band that made me pass the first go around and injects it with a new sense of power melody and upbeat melancholy that makes this album, to me, completely irresistible and endlessly replayable. As with their previous releases these songs seek to rock hard, and while they succeed in that wholly respectable goal, the layers of varied sound from strings, vocals, or deftly plucked guitar undertones broaden the spectrum of what you’d expect from a band with such decibel defying sound potential.
I’ve been to turning on Wolf’s Law in all of my usual listening situations and these songs shine in all of them- whether turned up loud in the car, or thumping in my headphones while slogging through a cold winter run. When listened to as a cohesive whole the album churns and boils from song to song with no noticeable weak spots throughout. As with any bunch of songs, however, certain highlights will emerge. Forest Serenade’s beautiful swell and burst melodies typifies the roller coaster of sound feel that pervades the album as a whole. Silent Treatment is a spectacular change of pace song, and (in addition to probably being my favorite song on the album) shows you how great the result can be when this band dials it back a bit. Finally Maw Maw Song is like a musical sucker punch to the gut, it hits hard (but you just don’t want it to stop.)
image courtesy of http://www.thejoyformidable.com
World Wide Whale 