Especially for those of us in the music journalism industry, it can seem nowadays like Brooklyn has become a self-sustaining facility for the mass production of deep, dreamy indie pop. With their debut LP, Sack Lunch, Slim Wray is a two-course meal that shatters that mold and attempts to light their home borough up with amplifier-frying fuzz and gravelly vocals fitting for a blue-collar bar fight.
It is much too easy to vaguely draw a connection with other garage rock duos like The Black Keys, and saying that a band “sounds like The Black Keys” doesn’t lead to much stimulating discussion, but it is impossible to deny that Slim Wray builds on a similar aesthetic. After all, they are a pair of guys who slam on their drums and guitar while paying homage to their roots through covers of songs like Them’s “Gloria” and The Sonics’ “Strychnine,” the latter of which sounds like it could be on Nirvana’s In Utero. In direct succession on the track listing, the two covers take over their own little section of the album that can easily be considered a highlight. The closing song, “Take A Number,” is a culmination of the full-length’s groovy riffs and barking vocals, perfect for highway hot rod cruising.
Chris Moran’s consistent drumming and backing vocals alongside Howzr’s sure-fire strumming and heavy metal-ready voice turn Sack Lunch into a great sign of things to come from Brooklyn, and serve as a beacon of hope for those who have little interest in listening to guys write entire albums about their heartbreaking existential crisis.
In A Word: Radical
