RIYL: Metric, Sleigh Bells, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Ra Ra Riot
Welch band The Joy Formidable rock with fervor on 2013’s “Wolf’s Law”, aiming for a place alongside today’s rock & roll headliners. Originally from North Wales but now based in London, The Joy Formidable have been recording since 2007, fronted by guitarist and lead singer Rhiannon “Ritzy” Bryan with Rhydian Dafydd on bass and Matthew James Thomas on percussion. After gaining some buzz with their debut EP “A Balloon Called Moaning” the group released their debut LP “The Big Roar” in early 2011 and toured for an impressive 12-months in support of the record.
“Wolf’s Law”, their second LP, was written mostly on tour and finds the band branching out sonically in spots while still mostly retaining their signature sound. Bryan’s vocals can soar at times and the choruses are catchy, but on the whole “Wolf’s Law” suffers from a lack of variety, with many of the songs sticking to a predictable sonic palette and often tending to blur into each other. A number of the tracks start with promising intros that are quickly swallowed up in distortion and reverb and never fully resurface.
The album opener ‘This Ladder Is Ours’ showcases the band’s sound quite well, with an intro of violins giving way to a catchy guitar lead and a propulsive drumming as Bryan pleads “Let’s sit and talk and slow things down/ Just be our old selves again finally.”
‘Cholla’ follows swiftly on its heels with more catchy guitar and bass riffing and a catchy vocal refrain but still feels somewhat predictable. ‘Tendons’ lays down a slinky Tool-esque intro but the track soon succumbs to a cookie cutter pattern of verse/chorus/verse that isn’t especially compelling. The only truly “soft” song here is ‘Silent Treatment’, which finds Bryan singing gently over a hushed bass line and acoustic guitar picking. The emotion gradually builds with some atmospheric layering effects but the song writing here isn’t earth-shattering.
At nearly 7-minutes long, the clear epic on “Wolf’s Law” is ‘Maw Maw Song’, a rousing rock anthem with a riff that easily lodges itself in the listener’s head but there isn’t nearly enough variety to keep the track compelling. The nearly 2-minute long guitar solo feels like filler and unfortunately the tail end of “Wolf’s Law” fails to offer up anything more noteworthy. The Joy Formidable have a great sound, but without innovative song writing “Wolf’s Law” fails to carry much bite.
