Wooden Shjips are heading east with their new album WEST
Music Hall of Williamsburg
66 North Sixth St.
Thursday, November 10, $13-$15, 9:00
718-486-5400
www.woodenshjips.com
www.musichallofwilliamsburg.com
San Francisco’s Wooden Shjips have created a monster epic with their latest disc, West (Thrill Jockey, September 2011). A heavy dose of psychedelic, experimental, hard-drivin’ spaced-out rock, the album demands to be played loud, the better to rattle around inside your brain longer. The seven-song suite, ostensibly about Manifest Destiny and the opening of the American West, is no mere Ennio Morricone acid trip; the opening track, “Black Smoke Rise,” mixes the Kinks’ “You Really Got Me” and “Superman” with early ’90s Sonic Youth, while “Home” blasts away with nods to both Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen. (We’re not kidding; just check out “Downbound Train” to see if we’re not completely crazy.) Featuring Ripley Johnson on guitar and vocals, Dusty Jermier on bass, Nash Whalen on organ, and Omar Ahsanuddin on drums, Wooden Shjips especially take flight on “Flight,” soaring into parts unknown. “I got something you ought to try,” Johnson sings on “Crossing,” and he could just as well be referring to the new album or the band’s live show; they’ll be at the Music Hall of Williamsburg on November 10 with Birds of Avalon and Citay.