86. Wand

Rough Trade East

14 May 2015

Another day, another album launch at Rough Trade East. Tonight’s offering is  Los Angeles’ finest fuzz merchants Wand, launching their second album Golem. Calling Wand a “stoner psych rock” band misses the point entirely. Golem is a snarling, swirling cocktail of lo-fi acid drizzle and tectonic doom crunch, shot through with falsetto vocals and alien guitar squalls that sound like they were patched in from a satellite falling out of orbit. The influences are there: Blue Cheer, Sabbath, Soft Machine but the execution is more unhinged and entirely their own.

I made my way to that familiar “stage” (a term used very generously at Rough Trade East, it's basically a box with ambition), and on slouched three lank-haired Californian lads with dilated pupils emerged, looking like they just teleported from Woodstock.

The lead singer, Corey, muttered something into the mic that may have been a greeting, a prophecy, or simply a request for more monitor. We’ll never know. The drummer gave a count-in and then the whole thing exploded into a glorious, sludgy soup of noise.

The set was short. Maybe six songs. Maybe four. Who can tell with this sort of thing? All I know is that it was LOUD. And good. Hair covered faces. Feet rooted. Guitars snarled and howled. Nobody moved except the crowd, bobbing politely like a stoned pack of meerkats.

When it was done, after the last sonic boom had rung out and they’d murmured a thank you in their lazy, SoCal drawl, they shuffled off stage with all the energy of a mildly depressed sloth.

The show was great. But the real headline was the post-gig conversation I had with Corey, who’d materialised behind the merch stand, looking like a man halfway through turning into a candle.

Here’s the verbatim exchange:

Me: “So where did the band name Wand come from?”

Corey: “Uh, dunno man. We got kinda messed up and thought it sounded mysterious. Lee was into D&D. Didn’t really think it through. Now no one can find us online, it’s all Harry Potter shit.”

Me: “Why not swap the A for an O?”

Corey: [long pause] “That’s... fucking genius, man. Shit, can we use that? Lee! Lee, man, come here!”

(Lee, the bassist, arrives. He is clearly tripping balls.)

Lee: “I love your pastries over here, dude. Chelsea buns are so fucking awesome.”

Me: “…”

Corey: “Yeah. We lost him.”