Prairiewolf – “Calcedonia”
I’d heard whispers of something tremendous brewing at the foot of the Rockies and the news was indeed as earth shaking as I’d hoped – the announcement of Prairiewolf’s debut studio record, out May 5th on the best psychedelic label in the nation, Centripetal Force. A Rocky Mountain supergroup of sorts featuring Stefan Beck (aka Golden Brown) on guitar and lap steel, Tyler Wilcox (Aquarium Drunkard) on bass, and Jeremy Erwin (the Heat Warps blog) on keys, this album features signature elements of each member’s sensibilities and the result is pulsar-like in its otherworldly awesome splendor. Unsurprising to learn that master masterer Andrew Weathers lent his magic. Petal Motel is elated to share the final single, “Calcedonia,” and a few words from the members themselves about the album’s conception and realization. The entire record is monumental, heady and meditative and rambling yet intentional. More hook and less wook – although there’s truly something for everyone here whether you’re into spiritual jazz, electronic ambient, kosmiche jam, and beyond.
All I gotta say after reading their responses, particularly the editing decisions is- release the extended versions!!!!! Listen to Calcedonia and read the exclusive written interview below.
Origins
Jeremy – A fair amount of material from this album has been incubating for over a decade. I tend to record a lot of home demos and just file them away. I’d try these out with other bands but none of them really took hold. I started pulling these tunes out when Stefan, Tyler and I first got together and they all worked. All of them. It was as though they just marinated for years waiting for the right vehicle.
There’s a lot to be said for making music you want to listen to. We started this thing because we’re all very into music that’s meditative, heady, easy on the ears.
Stefan – it was surprising when we first started playing together in early 2022 how much common musical language we all shared, both in what we listen to and the choices we would make in a given song. It’s really exciting for me to make music collaboratively after doing lots of solo work. I can bring an idea to Tyler and Jeremy, and they hear something different in it than I did, which brings out a more fully realized song in the end.
Tyler – In the past, I’ve played primarily in straight-ahead indie rock combos, so I wasn’t sure exactly how well I’d fit into the Prairiewolf mode. But by the end of our first rehearsal, I could see how cool it would be. I wouldn’t say it all came together immediately, but it didn’t take long. We definitely all speak a common musical language.
Influences
Jeremy – We all live in, and at the base of the Rocky Mountain front range and the influence of this environment is inescapable. All this grandeur can really send you inward. You’d expect this abundance of heady jazz, psych folk, cosmic music up here but it’s nonexistent. That’s what I dig about Golden Brown – Stefan’s music reflects this environment perfectly. We try to travel in that zone.
Stefan – I think we all share a musical foundation and love for spiritual jazz, which was kind of at the forefront when we first started playing together. Some of the first songs we played together were Don Cherry’s ‘Brown Rice,’ Alice Coltrane’s ‘Journey in Satchidananda,’ and Lonnie Liston Smith’s ‘Astral Traveling.’ The album is all original music and doesn’t really sound like any of those songs, but there is maybe a lingering vibration of some of that music in the air.
Tyler – It’s been cool to see the emergence of a cosmic American thing in the past few years — not so much in the Gram Parsons sense of the word, but more of an ambient-meets-the-American-west vibe. I’ve always loved Eno’s Apollo stuff, that blend of earth and space. Hopefully, Prairiewolf fits in alongside some of the more recent practitioners of that sound, while also bringing something fresh to the table.
Recording the Album
Jeremy – I’m very into scrappy-sounding records. Seams, off-mic chatter, tape hiss, rough punch-ins. For as much as I love to pore over details, I want to balance it out with a “first thought, best thought” mentality. Lee “Scratch” Perry’s stuff from the Black Ark is the pinnacle of that, where nothing you’ve recorded is sacred. It’s just an element to be used when it serves the whole, and muted when it doesn’t.
Recording “Calcedonia” might be my favorite memory from the sessions. It was a sort of telepathic interplay we locked in on within about 10 seconds into the take, at which point our collective energy slipped into a lower gear. We knew it was a good one when we came to. The track sounds to me like slow breathing – just a calm, steady pulse. The full take was 7 or 8 minutes long, like just about every other track on the record. We had to make some tough editing choices in the name of brevity.
Stefan – I definitely agree with Jeremy that the editing and whittling down of some 80+ minutes of music into a more concise form was really challenging. Jeremy did a fantastic job on editing, mixing, and capturing the essence of each tune in a shorter window.
Tyler – “Calcedonia” is definitely a favorite — kind of a JJ Cale meets Eno thing to my mind. A friend just described it as “a Nintendo soundtrack for a desert road trip” and I think that works, too.
Prairiewolf is out May 5th on Centripetal Force – pre-order the album on Bandcamp.
