I’ll be honest here: in the weird, nauseous, isolating, anxious political/social unrest that followed the November 2016 US presidential election, I sometimes felt it was easier and more comforting to let pure paralysis set-in and not DO much of ANYTHING…well, besides cower, maybe rant-and-rave among close friends, and bemoan the shocking-yet-certain FUCKED-NESS of my idiotic species as a whole.
Thankfully, though, the lads in space-country super-collective Woods took the opposite (and generally much more useful) tack of GETTING THE HECK TO WORK on a new record that would respond directly to the vitriolic hate and chronic apathy into which many of us seemed to be slipping deeper and deeper by the day.
Performed by Jeremy Earl (vocals, guitars, percussion), Jarvis Taveniere (bass), Aaron Neveu (drums, percussion), John Andrews (keys), Alec Spiegelman (sax, flute), and Cole Kamen-Green (trumpet) and recorded swiftly in the two months immediately-following the election; the six-track Love is Love album may clock-in at a brisk 32-minutes, but “it’s not a record borne entirely of angry, knee-jerk reaction to what America is becoming. Instead, it’s a meditation on love, and on what life means now.”
“There will be parts of life where we will watch as events unfold and we will feel helpless,” music writer Sam Hockley-Smith says of the album. “On good days, we’ll have each other. On the bad ones, we’ll turn to the art that helps us feel something.”
Well, I can tell you right now that one of those “good days” is going to be April 21, because that’s when the album is available digitally world-wide (with a physical release via Woodsist to follow on May 19). To help get this positivity-train rolling, they’ve already shared the album’s title track; and now, the album’s 2nd cut, a plaintive-yet-epic, horn-gilded anthem called “Bleeding Blue,” is available for your hope-bolstering pleasure right down below. Also, beginning May 18, you can catch nation-wide “Love is Love” tour in support of the new record — as well as in support of, you know: all of us not UTTERLY DESTROYING OURSELVES and TRASHING THIS PLACE WE ALL LIVE in the process.
Love is Love tracklisting:
01. Love Is Love
02. Bleeding Blue
03. Lost In A Crowd
04. Spring Is In The Air
05. Hit That Drum
06. Love Is Love (Sun On Time)
Love is also a tour:
05.18.17 - Los Angeles, CA - The Teragram Ballroom
05.19.17 - San Diego, CA - The Casbah
05.20.17 - Fresno, CA - Strummer’s
05.21.17 - San Francisco, CA - The Chapel
05.24.17 - Vancouver, BC - The Fox Cabaret
05.25.17 - Victoria, BC - Copper Owl
05.26.17 - Seattle, WA - Sunset Tavern
05.27.17 - Portland, OR - Portland Rose Festival
06.30.17 - Hudson, NY - Club Helsinki
07.02.17 - Boston, MA - Brighton Music Hall
07.04.17 - Barrington, NH - Boogie in the Barn
07.05.17 - Burlington, VT - ArtsRiot
07.06.17 - Montreal, QC - La Sala Rossa
07.07.17 - Toronto, ON - Garrison
07.10.17 - Chicago, IL - Empty Bottle
07.11.17 - Asheville, NC - Grey Eagle
07.12.17 - Richmond, VA - Strange Matter
07.13.17 - Washington, DC - Rock & Roll Hotel
07.14.17 - Philadelphia, PA - Underground Arts
07.15.17 - New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom