Tips for 2011: Howler

Tips for 2011: Howler by outroversion

Howler

For the enigmatic American Jordan Gatesmith, England's Rough Trade holds the key to his musical odyssey. A huge fan of early 21st century indie guitar bands such as The Libertines and Strokes whose home is the uber-cool independant label, the decision to put pen to paper on the contract offered to him was a simple one. Particularly as it is reported the label's representatives flew over to the states after one listen of the band's demos to get the required signatures. An hipocriphal tale? Call me pessimistic but I think the label's U.S Offices probably took care of this one...

They're probably going to be billed as "this year's Vaccines", who they toured with last year, but the Vaccines were a souless (and tuneless) marketing experiment, Howler, as far as I can tell, are a real band. With the raw guitar playing of the Strokes and Surf inspiration of the Drums with lyricism typical of a 90s indie child trying to mix it with the big boys. It's not all thrashed out heart on sleeve, there's piano and "feelings" in there neither of which are particularly welcome but it does open up other doors.

Fronting all this as I mentioned is Jordan Gatesmith, a gawky but supremely confident Minnesotan; his Facebook url giving a good idea of the esteem he holds himself in (theillustriousteensensationjordanjmoneygatesmith). He's said a lot but no one's really listening yet, whether he'll approach his band's soon to come fame with the understated nature of a musically minded Julian Casablancas or just be another Johnny Borrell (he fronted a band called Razorlight back in the zero's, wore white trousers, said he was going to be the biggest rock star in the world.. no?). Anyway all this remains to be seen, listen to the music and ignore the bravado, there's good times to be had.

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