Howl On the Haunted Beat You Ride

Howl On the Haunted Beat You Ride

When hip indie acts try to recreate the warm analogue hiss and vintage vinyl tones of their favorite old records, the result often plays back with a handful of anachronisms giving away the modernity of the project. Had Detroit's the Go kept original member Jack White in the band (he left in 1996 to start the White Stripes), Howl On the Haunted Beat You Ride might sound like such an album. But these recordings resonate with such authentic antiquity, that songs like "You Go Bangin' On" and "Caroline" could easily be mistaken for a lost Mungo Jerry outtake or a Ringo Starr B-side. "Refrain" gets headier in a Muswell Hillbillies-era Kinks setting, while "Mary Ann" borrows boyish earnestness from early Nazz recordings with a playfully catchy chorus that the Hollies would be proud of. "Smile" moves with a serpentine slickness as singer Bobby Harlow coolly sneers, "You don't find a love like mine every day just to throw away." Because Howl is the kind of album that grows on you song by song, the overall result comes off sounding more classically ambitious than unapologetically retro.

Select a country or region

Africa, Middle East, and India

Asia Pacific

Europe

Latin America and the Caribbean

The United States and Canada