Wild Nothing - Golden Haze EP
- Written by Antonio Tzikas
The term ‘glo-pop’ has been attributed to Will Tatum a.k.a. Wild Nothing on account of his brand of forlorn bedroom pop - I’m not sure whether that’s a shortening of gloom or if it’s supposed to mean glow, as both seem like feasible terms to describe Wild Nothing’s music, which, while being moody and gloomy, also emanates a vibe of warmth and comfort. Perfect company for an afternoon spent moping around.
Although we’re living in times in which there is certainly no shortage of American acts reviving the British sound of the ‘80s (The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Beach Fossils and The Drums to name but a few) Wild Nothing do more than just emulate an established sound - they use it in moderation as a means to create perfectly crafted cuts of jangly melancholy pop whereas others may simply imitate.
As soon as opener ‘Golden Haze’ begins, a glaring similarity to The Cure is thrust forward in the simple echoey guitar riff and mechanical sounding drums but the song is just so catchy that all feelings of “Another rip off then…” soon disappear as the haze mentioned in the title takes over. The record continues with the same formula throughout but doesn’t get tiresome or boring at any point, once the soothing riffs of ‘Golden Haze’ mellow out the mood, the songs simply fly by.
The highlight of the EP has to be five-minute centrepiece ‘Your Rabbit Feet’ which is simply sublime and demonstrates the real talent behind Wild Nothing - a talent for songwriting that goes way beyond any revivalist tags that may be placed upon him. Closing track ‘Vulture Like Lovers‘ is the anomaly of the record that shows signs of an original sound creeping through and features reverb laden drums, some beautiful guitar lines and a washy, eerie vocal.
While it’s highly unlikely that Wild Nothing will get much bigger than they are now, this EP is worth remembering, as it’s not just another attempt at a bandwagon jump. The songs it contains really do have something more to them than those of their peers and another full length release in the near future is sure to become hidden gem to be discovered in 20 years time, just like The Field Mice have been in the past few years - and who would have thought that?