I ran into my friend Matt Tady of the infamous Cosmic Tady Brothers last Friday at Jardine’s, and he informed me that his brother was in a new band called Dream Wolf. Having jammed with Chris Tady, the guitarist, the man, the mystery, with Fiat and Jeremy from Deep Hope on occasion, I was excited to see what he’d been up to. He has a classic rock foundation to his playing, but he also ventures out into distant galaxies with his effects pedals, discreet finger-tapping embellishments, and floaty picking patterns. Though I wasn’t thrilled about seeing a show at The Brick, an establishment described well by its name, I was willing to go to check out this new group.

As always, the Brick was practically empty when I got there. The show was scheduled to go on at 10:00, and I was a bit late, but still no one was set up yet. I was told by an employee that the show was actually starting around 10:30, which was about the time Dream Wolf showed up. They started just a bit after 10:45. Dream Wolf is a strangely arranged quartet consisting of two guitarists, a female lead singer and (ahem) a drummer. I would list everyone’s names, but so far Dream Wolf has no internet info source of any kind, and Chris Tady is harder to get a hold of than a greased midget. Even the Facebook account they told me about has strangely disappeared since that night. Had I foreseen this problem, I would’ve asked them and taken notes. Note taken.

Dream Wolf opened the show with a twangy folkish tune that bobbed along playfully and filled the room with awkwardness and curiosity. The song itself was straight forward, but the young look of the group was incongruent with its style. From there they went on to a tune that I’ve included with this article called “Dan.” It was my favorite tune that night, and I think it displays what this band does right. It opens with an outpouring of sunshine calling a person whose name the song adopted. From there Chris Tady trades the lead vocals with the girl in butterfly boots and a nice crunchy classic rock riff drives the tune along its verses. From this point on, the show seemed to go downhill. Though the freshness of the material was able to keep my attention to a certain degree, the problems Dream Wolf had with execution marred the performance irreparably.

The whole night, Chris Tady played and sang well. His experience shined through every tune and the band benefited greatly from his clever licks and bright, playful solos. The lead singer also did well. Her voice is full and distinct, and she evidently has good ears. With a little bit of formal training her intonation could be excellent. Her stage presence is also impressive. She usually has some sort of auxiliary percussion instrument with her (even a kazoo once in a while) and dances in proportion to the energy she exudes. The other half of the band, however, left something to be desired. The rhythm guitarist, a young, tall and skinny guy who looked as if he had recently retired from his emo phase, didn’t play badly, but seemed to add little to the overall sound of the band. He may have filled out the harmony, but in a band with such thin instrumentation, he should be playing with more confidence and adding more rhythm and energy. Last but certainly not least, the drummer sucked the life right out of most of the set.

When I first saw him load in, I was already skeptical. His set looked as if he bought it at a garage sale, painted in a checkered pattern and scratched up. His bass drum was even completely missing the outer head. Once he started playing, I discovered that the set sounded even worse than it looked. His snare drum was turned off the whole time (or else he had no snare on it, I couldn’t tell) and his drums sounded like they hadn’t been tuned since he bought them. His playing didn’t help either. He sat on a toddler’s chair rather than a drum throne, setting his knees higher than his drum heads for his elbows to dodge. Not only did he play simple beats, but he somehow managed to fuck up frequently and throw the whole band off. And, I won’t officially say that I definitely know for sure, but I think I saw him playing with his index finger pressed parallel to the stick on more than one occasion.

Dream Wolf only played a thirty minute set, and I sensed that this was a result of them arriving late. Honestly, I think that was all I could bare at that point anyway. The original concepts and eccentricity of the music is definitely working for them. They were able to get my head bobbing here and there when the drummer hit an accuracy streak, and I was pleasantly surprised when they did a cover of one of Blur’s best songs, “Tender.” I would much prefer to listen to them than most contemporary pop, but they need to polish their sound. Even if they are going for a lo-fi aesthetic, sloppy drumming and a shy rhythm guitar sucks the life out of their music. It seems at first glance that the instrumentation was chosen for its efficiency, but two guys dragging the rhythm is horribly wasteful. Actually, I think they would do well dropping the second guitar all together and picking up a drummer who owns a drumset they care about. I hate to speak ill of anything my friend Chris Tady is working on, but I don’t see Dream Wolf reaching a level of success they would be satisfied with until they put their wet little noses to the grindstone.

Audio Recorded 1st May 2010 © Nectar Notes

Published Wednesday 5th May 2010 - Written by Jeff Benjamin