Published: December 03, 2007 04:09 pm            

With the Redwalls, rock ‘n’ roll is here to stay

INDIANAPOLIS — Back in the beginning of this century, when their peers were transfixed by Eminem’s sociopathic wordplay and the latest forms of mechanized music, the members of the Redwalls were too busy raiding their parents’ record collections to notice.

“I’m surprised more people aren’t turned on by it,” says Redwalls guitarist/vocalist Andrew Langer of such gems as the Beach Boys’ “Wild Honey” and the Rolling Stones’ “Beggars Banquet.”

The four friends took their love for shabby rock in its neo-soul nascency and turned it into an ode to the past with an eye to the future. They initially started as the Pages, playing covers in dive bars at 1 a.m. around their native Chicago.

“You’d have to play to a bunch of drunk people for two hours,” Langer says. “You might as well give them something they like too.”

The effort was enough to garner them major-label attention, and after releasing their debut, 2003’s “Universal Blues,” on an indie they signed to Capitol Records. They changed their name to the Redwalls after learning Capitol alumni Mr. Mister once operated under the same name. The deal lasted for only one release, “DE NOVA,” because soon after Capitol merged with Virgin Records and the Redwalls became one of the deal’s many casualties. For the self-titled follow-up, the band is now utilizing the facilities of MAD Dragon Records, a student-run label at Philadelphia’s Drexel University.

“We’re all pretty happy with it,” Langer says. “All the major labels have seen better days. You have a lot more control now of what you want to put out, and how you want to put it out. The label we’re on now is good for that because it’s student-run. The people who work at the label actually want to be there. There’s a lot more freedom and excitement within the label.”

While their third full-length retains a cockney attitude and dynamic sound structure, the Redwalls took a more organic tack when recording it in Sweden last year.

“Pretty much we’d just go in every day, sit down, talk about what we wanted to do for the day, and go into the live room and lay down all the basic tracks,” Langer says. “It was all recorded live, and we’d just build on top of it. We were going for an overall feeling with the songs. It was a lot more natural.”

Natural isn’t a word easily associated with a lot of today’s music. The Redwalls believe they’re one of a small vanguard preserving rock ‘n’ roll’s essence. Its evolution is another matter.

“It could be as promising as the people who want to keep it alive,” Langer says. “It just depends. It’s a form of art that’s still relatively new compared to other forms of music. That’s what we’re trying to do. We’re pretty strong believers who’ve chosen to be a straight-up rock ‘n’ roll band that doesn’t use all these new digital effects and computer loops. We’re a live band that tries to bring out that old feeling in a new way.”



Wade Coggeshall writes for the Hendricks County Flyer in Avon, Ind.

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Online:

www.theredwalls.com