Why?
California's alternative Hip Hop sensation Why? have confirmed the brand new ‘Sod In The Seed EP’, to be released on the 13th of August via City Slang in Europe and Anticon in the US.
The limited edition 1000 12" vinyl will only be available on the tour (dates below) and in selected shops. It will be also available digitally.
Three years after Why? turned the oft-boxed music world on its cauliflower ear with a pair of odd pop stunners - ‘Alopecia’ and its quieter cousin ‘Eskimo Snow’ - these meticulous and morbid Midwestern men return refreshed, a new album in the holster and an EP for your immediate enjoyment. ‘Sod in the Seed’ is a scion of the WHY? to come.
Sure, there's familiarity to glom to: psych-warped sunshine choruses, folksy jangle, internally knotted rhyme schemes, confessionals cut with wry wit and crude details.
But these new songs also signify a general toughening up: Yoni Wolf, Josiah Wolf and Doug McDiarmid in the pocket, the unbreakable rock core at the center of a spinning ball of sound.
Far from their native Cincinnati, the band spent a month and a half in the Denton, Texas, studio of Centro-Matic's Matt Pence, and wrangled an ace crew of University of North Texas gunslingers to exact their wilder schemes: woodwinds, horns, strings, a choir.
While the interim between WHY? releases found the fellas turning out intimate tunes for lucky fans (via their Golden Ticket contest) and intricate beats for rapper Serengeti's praised Family & Friends LP, ‘Sod in the Seed’ marks a genuine culmination.
Here, the "blundering braggart" and his right-hand dudes detail dastardly deeds and hopeless romanticisms over a colourful and living score.
Produced by the Wolf brothers and mixed in Atlanta by Graham Marsh with Yoni, every song pops exactly as it should, smearing genre with pointed intent until the end result is a gorgeously articulated work of unusual artistry and catchiness - a Why? record, of course.