Hometown Sounds

In advance of the release of sophomore album Golden Age Thinking, yesterday indie folk band Wylder dropped the music video for the second single “Ghosts”. The song was written about singer Will McCarry’s childhood home, “a ramshackle farmhouse which had at some point been dragged down off the Appalachian mountains on the back of a tractor.” Director Samuel Rodgers sets McCarry in a similar rustic cabin in this beautiful video that ends with a warm touch that is very on brand for Wylder. How about grabbing tickets now to their hometown album release show at the Hamilton on Friday July 12th? The band promises “a host of orchestral musicians as they perform their new record its entirety, as well as all your old favorites.”

Indie folk band Wylder spent last summer in sunny L.A. recording their second full length album Golden Age Thinking. Now comes the hard part of marketing, publicizing and performing the record, and the young quartet have launched an Indiegogo campaign to get help from their many dedicated fans. Time is ticking for you to snag benefits like signed vinyl and VIP passes. As veterans of our Millennium Stage series, we love how this band makes such fun and accessible music their own way with true independence and hard work. The new album’s first single “Ready To Break”, overflowing with hand claps and strumming, just premiered with this music video directed by Sam Rodgers. Frantically moving from location to location all over the area, we love the many delightful touches in this video, from the echo-y bridge in Union Station to parents dancing in the next room. Wylder play Ivy City’s City Winery next Thursday March 14th with Strong Water and Eli Lev & The Fortunes Found.

Musicians sometimes first make “album versions” of songs that later evolve into new realms after countless performances shape the structure and flourishes we first encountered in our headphones. There’s a disconnect between fans that play a song’s album version over and over to learn it by heart and the musicians that perform it night after night and can’t help but tinker with it each time. Indie folk quartet Wylder bridges this by updating two songs from their 2016 debut album Rain and Laura to accompany two new songs recorded at White Star Sound in Charlottesville VA. Reminiscent of HTS loves The Cowards Choir, Wylder brought in cameras to film the recording experience, and today they released this video for the dreamy new song “The Lake”. The four song EP Live at White Star Sound comes out just prior to their next show headlining U Street Music Hall on Saturday February 17th, so you can pre-order the EP and buy your advance tickets right now.