Album: “Marwill Street”

Band: “The Marwills”

Independently released Dec. 28, 2012
All songs by The Marwills
Album written, performed, recorded, mastered, and manufactured in Canada

LINER NOTES:

Vocals: Brett Bonvie
Guitars: Jesse Morrissey & Graeme McGillivray
Drums: James Law
Bass: Adam Stevens
Backup Vocals: Danielle Knibbe
Saxophones: Savic Panylyk
Trumpet: Sean White
Trombone: Matt White

Recorded at The Root Cellar Toronto, ON.
Tracks 2&7 recorded at OIART, London, ON.

Mixing Engineer: James Law
Mastering Engineer: Sam Ibbett
Produced by: The Marwills
Artwork and Graphic Design: Cameron La Fave

Album tracks: 1.Two Hearts 2. Don’t Cry 3. Tell Me Doctor 4. Let Me Know 5. Burn Down Easy 6. Guns In Texas 7. Wheelhouse Grind 8.Wicked Woman 9. Moonshine Hill 10. Empty Road.

There is something raw and visceral about the album Marwill Street by Canadian rockers The Marwills. Perhaps it’s the allusion to the rock greats like The Rolling Stones,  The Doors, Led Zeppelin, The Beatles and even 10 CC that make their sound incendiary. From the start of the first track Two Hearts, Brett Bonvie surely delivers gut wrenching emotional psychedelia that can even take the crown from veteran bands like Cream. It’s just a matter of time before the public will ignite their music  into the stratosphere of rock iconography. The music characteristic is generally  of pulsing nature interspersed by smashing melodic guitars. But they also add a bit of spaces for the sound to breath and even introducing nuance which is something you can’t find in present day rock bands.

I am not surprised by their serious musicality. Members have their own musical side projects dabbling with other genres. I can imagine that if they’d been around in my college years, my friends who were music snubs at that time would go crazy because this is what real musicians should sound like. Well at least that’s how I imagine them thinking at that time. But if you ask my opinion? I’d think the same way.

The band has this constant sound throughout the album whither they are playing fast, syncopated or slow tracks. That consistency is perhaps the result of skill and technique I guess. Classical musicians have this. You can really tell if a sound is tightly woven but played with light fingers possessed by virtuoso players. It is hard to tell which one is my favorite. If I take all the tracks apart and compare them it would be impossible because each one has its own shining moment. Take for instance track four called Let Me Know. That bass part swagger like an aristocratic debonaire and everything just follows.

Burn Down Easy is one of their heavily played song which is the band’s single. A music video of that single is now available via youtube. And though this is an amazing track, it is just a teaser to the full potential that awaits when you listen to the album.

Now let’s go into lyrical content.

I admit I am a bad reviewer of lyrical content because my fascination or ability is with sound. But I still have to because you people out there are not like me. And perhaps you would be drawn to bands that don’t put out songs like “oh baby baby I love you yeah yeah.” Well, subjects covered by The Marwills are existentialist angst(Tell Me Doctor), pathological relationships (Two Hearts), illicit sex(Don’t Cry) and politics (Guns in Texas) among other things. Now if you are curious like me, then browsing through the band’s Bio should give you a clue. ” But we held on today and we jumped to my Camaro and tomorrow never came” will give you an idea whose experience this song refers to. But then again, good songwriters can still create a scenarios that seem autobiographical and they’re so good you think it’s real.

I think anyone who is into intelligent rock should get this album. I mean if you believe you have a kind of mature and sophisticated taste for rock of the classic kind then Marwill Street will appeal to you. Listen more by visiting their official site: http://www.themarwills.ca/

Video/song sample

Gallery