Music review: Ladyhawk — ‘Shots’

Ladyhawk

Shots

Jagjaguwar

Rating: 3

Ladyhawk is one of those bands you heard at the bars and in a moment of drunken conviction bought their album. You dug their grungy sound, their emotive howls and killer guitar solos. What you didn’t realize was that you were drunk at the time, and that the album you bought, their sophomore offering Shots, isn’t nearly as raw or exciting as you remembered.

Not edgy enough to be a grunge band, yet too guitar-driven for pop, the quartet from Vancouver misfires with Shots. Recorded in an abandoned farmhouse, the lo-fi album lacks the polished arrangements that launched the similar-sounding band Wolf Parade to indie stardom. At the same time, the album lacks the creative exploration and fuck-it-all edge that makes lo-fi rock so entertaining. Shots is still rock music, but it’s a little confused.

“Night You’re Beautiful“ highlights this lack of direction, as the band fumbles through different time signatures and styles. The rough and tumble verses transition into a twee-pop chorus, which features a strange combination of lead singer Duffy Driediger’s fuzzy voice with pop-inspired backing vocals. This all gives way to waves of electric guitars before the song inconspicuously ends.

Ladyhawk attempts to maneuver their precarious genre-bending by cranking up the guitars and melting some faces with a guitar solo – the only problem is that they do it in every song. With moments of catchy lyricism, the album’s closer “Ghost Blues“ succumbs to Ladyhawk’s cure-all method by overwhelming the listener with 10 minutes of epic guitar solos. “Faces of Death“ is an equally low point on Shots, as Driediger muses about loneliness and death in between the requisite guitar solo, “I know there‘s no such thing as endless love / Only a joke told in very poor taste / That somehow keeps cracking me up.“

When Ladyhawk shines on their sophomore release, they hint that they’re onto something great. At their best, the band delivers memorable anthems by blending melodies with a healthy dose of angst. In the opener, “I Don’t Always Know What You‘re Saying,“ Driediger laments an age-old truism about relationships: Women are hard to understand. With the combination of swirling, driving and soloing guitars, the track ends in a confusion that reflects Driediger‘s girl problems. I‘ll drink to that.

The stars align for Ladyhawk in the album’s highlight, the two-minute “S.T.H.D.“ A tight arrangement helps focus the guitar work, which is a pleasant departure from the aimless soloing heard in almost every other track. Between Driediger’s emotive bellows, tasteful guitar lines accompany the movement of the song, which rises to an exciting cacophony.

While their creative direction seems to be at a crossroads, Ladyhawk’s thematic content is consistent. They are a skin-deep rock band in that their songs revolve around angst, guitar solos and not much else. There are no epiphanies or revelations on Shots – just a handful of hit songs and a hangover.

Ladyhawk is playing Friday with Neva Dinova at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco. Best enjoyed with friends over several beers. For more information on the band, visit ladyhawkladyhawk.com.

–Chris Rue

Give these tracks a listen:

“I Don’t Always Know What You’re Saying“

“S.T.H.D.“

For fans of: Wolf Parade, Neil Young and Crazy Horse