The Young Republic change style completely; remain really bloody good
It hasn’t been this bad since my grandpa was a kid
He made it through – he never told us what he did
Has any line summed up the state of the world currently as much as that?
Of all of the bands I’ve had the pleasure of writing about on here, it’s The Young Republic that have developed the most of a band in that time. If I’m honest, I’d been a little apprehensive about the direction the band had been taking of late. Moving to Nashville from Boston and trading in the gentle indiepop of their earlier releases for a more classic rock, Americana influenced kind of sound was a risky gambit. While the results were largely very good, nothing really blew me away in the way those earliest songs did.
That changed when a couple of songs from the band’s upcoming release Balletesque dropped into my inbox though. The instrumentation on The Wolf suggests a band far larger than it’s current six member lineup. Indeed, the band never sounded this rich even as an eight piece. The real revelation here though is the songwriting of Julian Saporiti. Each verse manages to outdo the previous in both content and wordplay. This is certainly the closest he has come to not just writing like Dylan, but sounding like him too. Sure, it’s a lazy comparison given their Isis cover a while back, but we’re well beyond sounding like Belle and Sebastian at this point.
Balletesque will presumably be released in the nearish future.
Glad you’re liking these. So am I, although I think they had a sticky patch as their style changed. There was definitely a period where they seemed to be wrestling with it a little, but I am really liking this album, which is great news.
Indeed, I feared they were going to lose my interest at some points during the transition, right up to seeing them live in September. This is really good stuff though, so thankfully all is well.