Born and bred in London, the band Wolf Alice made its way across the pond to Oakland\u2019s Fox Theater on Oct. 10, marking its first stop in California \u2014 or what the band lovingly described as \u201cthis strip of highway.\u201d<\/p>\n
This pit stop in the Bay Area was one of the band\u2019s last in the United States, and unfortunately, if you were present for its show in Oakland, you could tell.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wolf Alice is a well-known staple of the alternative, indie rock \u2014 and arguably shoegaze \u2014 scene, especially in the U.K. The band is composed of four members: lead vocalist Ellie Rowsell, guitarists Joff Oddie and Theo Ellis and drummer Joel Amey. The North American leg of the tour went on without Oddie, who is awaiting the birth of his first child. Instead, he was replaced with guitarist John Victor and Ryan Malcolm on the keys.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The band is five months into touring its fourth studio album, The Clearing, shedding its beloved grunge reputation in favor of a stripped-back, shining \u201970s nostalgia.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The downswing wasn\u2019t so palpable at first: Wolf Alice started out slowly with \u201cThorns,\u201d the first track on its latest album. Rowsell was backlit by a lone spotlight, the vocalist strutting as her shadow lurked melodramatically across the stage. The silhouette left nothing on display but her vocals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the end of the song, the spotlight reversed, revealing an embellished, white, glam rock getup. Rowsell wore a flouncy yet tight jeweled bodysuit atop a pair of opaque white tights and slouchy boots. Somewhere between David Bowie, ABBA and an ill-fitting diaper, some rock star must have come out of retirement to lend Rowsell the outfit.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The staging was minimal, as stripped as the band\u2019s new image and as improvised as a last minute \u201cMamma Mia!\u201d-themed birthday party with silver wall tinsel draped from the back wall and a lone disco ball hanging from the ceiling.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Throughout the concert, the songs came in quick succession: \u201cWhite Horses\u201d to \u201cJust Two Girls\u201d to \u201cThe Sofa.\u201d Wading through Wolf Alice\u2019s discography, crew members swapped guitars from off the band\u2019s backs.<\/p>\n
That said, when Wolf Alice does perform, it does so flamboyantly. For guitarists Ellis and Victor, every strum was an over-the-top performance that left them hunched and posing. Both impressive and frivolous, they spent almost as much time playing as they did doing tricks and posing with their instruments.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Halfway through the concert, the band kicked things up with \u201cBread Butter Tea Sugar\u201d; Rowsell stood at the center of a star-shaped spotlight and propped herself up into a \u201970s power pose. The spangled glitz of classic rock \u2019n\u2019 roll almost seemed like it never went out of style with the band\u2019s slow struttin\u2019 guitar solos and hair blowing in the wind.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But by the third time Rowsell dropped to her knees and let the wind take the lead, the shtick got stale.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Maybe it was the mixing, maybe it was the accents, but something about Wolf Alice\u2019s performance was distinctly illegible. Throughout the performance it was hard to tell if the tracks were too loud or if the singing, although undeniably skilled, was inaudible due to Rowsell\u2019s thick North London accent. While the songs sounded familiar, they were indistinguishable, an incoherent mix of recognizable sweet sounds and utter gibberish.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Near the end \u2014 arguably at the peak of the performance \u2014 the band departed from the steady and dramatic with the song \u201cSadboy.\u201d From its album Visions of a Life, the song is more noise \u2014 or screams \u2014 than is characteristic of Wolf Alice. While this added a different flavor to the Wolf Alice experience, the screams melding into gritty sound did not help with the inaudibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Although an encore is never guaranteed, the quintet propped itself back on stage to perform their biggest hit to date, \u201cDon\u2019t Delete the Kisses.\u201d With red wine by Rowsell\u2019s side and beer in the boys\u2019 hands, the band let guitar tricks and power poses go by the wayside, as they simply moved through the motions of the song.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sure, Wolf Alice left something on stage, but I sincerely hope it wasn\u2019t its best.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Born and bred in London, the band Wolf Alice made its way across the pond to Oakland\u2019s Fox…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6109,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[6560,6565,7,6559,6557,6549,6554,6551,6548,6552,6563,6547,6561,143,145,144,6553,6566,6555,6564,6550,6558,6556,6562,6546],"class_list":["post-6108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-abba","tag-bread-butter-tea-sugar","tag-california","tag-david-bowie","tag-dont-delete-the-kisses","tag-ellie-rowsell","tag-fox-theater","tag-joel-amey","tag-joff-oddie","tag-john-victor","tag-just-two-girls","tag-london","tag-mamma-mia","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-ryan-malcolm","tag-sadboy","tag-the-clearing","tag-the-sofa","tag-theo-ellis","tag-thorns","tag-visions-of-a-life","tag-white-horses","tag-wolf-alice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}