New Music: Steel Wool – Fading

Something is stirring within shoegaze and dreampop, as bands like Steel Wool take from other, seemingly incompatible, genres and strive to bring the listener something new.

Fading, which is from the band’s new self-titled EP, slowly shifts from expected sonic keynotes; as the emotional fervour of the lyrics escalates, so does the honeyed ambience of the arrangement.

Halfway through, a wall of distortion hits you before suddenly falling away, repeating that once more, as if mimicking the ebb and flow of a conversation that can’t be left to fade away, as if emotions are to raw and too new.

States the band about the EP, “Steel Wool is a collision of sound experiments wearing the borrowed work uniform of rock music. With a DIY punk bassist, a college indie pop guitarist, a metalhead drummer, and a singer-songwriter up front, the band has always been more of a sonic game of tug-of-war than a regiment in lockstep.”

“Stepping outside these orthogonal backgrounds in search of common ground, we’ve ended up somewhere that isn’t quite home turf for any of us. The EP is a first step in five directions, sidling towards shoegaze, jangle pop, screamo, folk, and something else we can’t quite figure out a name for.”

“With this record, we’ve crystallized the collaborative efforts of four new friends and bandmates, staking our flag in land we’re still yet to entirely survey.”

Steel Wool is Sean Lissner on guitar and vocals, Jaden Amjadi on bass and vocals, Evan Landi on drums, and Sam Schlesinger on guitar.

Steel Wool is out now via LA label Bug Body and is streaming on Bandcamp – where you can also get the EP on cassette – YouTube Music, and Spotify. The band celebrates the EP release at El Cid in Los Angeles on the 22nd of April – for details, hit up the band on Instagram.