There was a time when most rock bands would gladly have tossed their bass player off of a cliff for the chance to snatch a lock of Rick Rubin's beard hair, let alone coax the reclusive record producer and Def Jam label impresario into a studio. But the aspiring rockers of the post-file-sharing era may want to consult Howlin' Rain's The Russian Wilds, and then reassess whether or not courting the nation's leading rock'n'roll yogi is worth the time and effort.
Crafted over a period of four years with extensive guidance from Rubin, the San Francisco quintet's latest full-length has all the tropes of a record-as-game-changer-- it's moody and duende-soaked, meticulously crafted, and sprawling in its ambition. But The Russian Wilds is not the neo-jam-band classic it might have been. A conscious stab at classic album-making-- with all of the madness, obsession, and studio overtime that allegedly entails-- The Russian Wilds strives for timelessness, but sounds temporally adrift.
In 2006, Howlin' Rain were little more than singer/guitarist Ethan Miller's side project-- a groovy aside to his main gig with psych-rock kamikazes Comets on Fire. But it had a niche. Where Comets skewed toward scuzzy chaos, Howlin' Rain made a conscious effort to splice the mellow sounds of 1970s radio past with New Weird America present. "I was trying to make it represent the nature and vibe of California, musically," Miller told Arthur magazine in an interview that trailed the group's self-titled release. "I wanted to sonically represent the history of California bands." That article brought the band to the attention of Rubin, who, after being suitably impressed with the band's live show, released Howlin' Rain's sophomore LP, Magnificent Fiend, on his imprint, American Recordings, and offered to produce its next album.
Nearly half a decade later, the work is done. In the years that it took to make The Russian Wilds, entire bands have gone from 7" to LP to bargain bin. Most of Howlin' Rain's new-weird peers-- like Comets on Fire or Brightblack Morning Light-- have either broken up or receded from the spotlight. Times have changed.
Howlin' Rain have, too. During the intervening years, the group has been almost entirely re-staffed, with only Miller and keyboardist/guitarist Joel Robinow sticking around from the Magnificent Fiend lineup. But there's been a distinct sonic shift as well. At Rubin's urging, the band has moved its classic-rock reference points southward-- away from Bay Area favorites like the Grateful Dead and toward Los Angeles groups such as Little Feat and the Eagles. The riffs are softer and funkier, not that far adrift from the shores of yacht rock. Miller has refined his singing style, too. Where he used to bleat and holler like Ted Nugent's punk-rock grandson, here he dials back the wailing in favor of clarity.
The band's ear for epic prog-rock pageantry remains intact. Many of the songs on The Russian Wilds muscle past the six-minute mark, letting Miller and lead guitarist Isaiah Mitchell (on loan from San Diego stoner titans Earthless) exercise their shreddiest instincts. On album opener "Self Made Man", three-part harmonies and gentle strumming give way to dueling dive-bomb solos. The band's new-weird chops are more visible here than in the past if only because they stand in sharper juxtaposition to Miller's soft-rock songwriting.
As a producer, Rubin pushes hard for songwriters to reach into deep, dark places and wring out the bleak bile of their soul in song. Miller meets that challenge with lyrics about suicide ("Strange Thunder"), self-doubt ("Self Made Man"), and regret ("Can't Satisfy Me Now"). But gloom and doom aren't a natural fit for Howlin' Rain.
The Russian Wilds' main failing, though, is that, in comparison to the band's concerts, it feels flat. According to Miller, Rubin put him through his paces during the demo process-- pushing the band to write and discard an extra album's worth of material and to set aside its notions of genre. But genre writing is central to Howlin' Rain's appeal. On Magnificent Fiend the band was blissfully aware that it was a punked-up cartoon of 1970s rock. On The Russian Wilds, their sense of purpose sounds clouded, and the performances ultimately suffer. The force of self-examination sands down the band's ecstatic energy.
In interviews, Miller is honest that the making of The Russian Wilds was, for the most part, a drag. Never in a rush to get anything done, Rubin would disappear for long periods of time, leaving the band high and dry. That's one thing when a band is financially independent, but another when you're recording a group of California psych-rock lifers who are struggling to pay rent. Had all of the self-help and record-studio psychodrama been set aside, there's every reason to believe that Howlin' Rain could have simply bashed out The Russian Wilds in a weekend and moved on.
