My Top 100 Albums: #80 - Wolf Alice, ‘Visions of a Life’
80.
Wolf Alice, ‘Visions of a Life’
Dirty Hit, 2017
Formed as an acoustic folk pop duo in 2010, Wolf Alice has developed, over the past decade, into perhaps one of the finest alternative rock bands of its generation, and certainly one of the more sophisticated. Clash Magazine has described the band’s music as “the lovechild of folk and grunge”, and the band has drawn comparisons to the likes of nineties’ groups Elastica and Hole. It seems to me that, in the realm of female-fronted rock bands, Ellie Rowsell’s Wolf Alice are indeed the natural successors to the profound and intricate music that Courtney Love and her band were creating in the mid-’90s, and Visions of a Life currently stands as the most realised product of this project. This is immediately evident on the album’s lead single Yuk Foo, a tongue-in-cheek and boisterous punk rock polemic, as well as in the likes of Space & Time, a pacey, shouty paean to anxiety. What makes this album so special, in my mind, is the band’s extremely refined treatment of its various genres and influences. It accommodates the more conventional pop that the band had already become known for on tracks like Don’t Delete The Kisses and Formidable Cool whilst retaining room for experimentation on the rock banger Beautifully Unconventional and the eight-minute-long, anthemic closing track Visions of a Life. Rowsell’s voice is so versatile that she is able to adroitly navigate the passage through genres, from loud and intense punk vocals to the sweet, delicate and lyrical melodies on tracks like Sky Musings and Sadboy. Thematically, the album is universal and grounded, treating issues from hesitant romance to uncompromising sexuality to heartache and depression. On Sadboy, Rowsell is unyielding: “Who hurt you Sadboy?/There’s a dark cloud above your head/Who hurt you Sadboy?/You act like you’re already dead.” The album, like Rowsell’s lyrics, pulls no punches - it is resolute in its diversity, and is all the better for it. Not a single track here feels out of place, despite the band exploring a range of genres, including alternative rock, noise rock, shoegaze, punk rock, dream pop, grunge, psychedelia, folk, space rock, synth-pop, hardcore, and electronica. As a rock project, this album is unrivalled in its era.
Hidden Highlight: Beautifully Unconventional
Heavenward
Yuk Foo
Beautifully Unconventional
Don’t Delete The Kisses
Planet Hunter
Sky Musings
Formidable Cool
Space & Time
Sadboy
St. Purple & Green
After the Zero Hour
Visions of a Life