There is something inspiring about the purity of purpose behind Steeple, the 1st LP proper by Wolf People, that reminds me of similarly revivalist US rockers Dead Meadow. Where the latter took the pungent atmospheres and sludgy riffs of late 60s psychedelia as a jumping off point, the former present a kind of hazy meshing of the blues-redolent riffage of a Led Zep or Blue Cheer and pastoral English folk of Fairport Convention. Steeple, like Dead Meadow, is not reinventing the wheel, but rather taking the specific enthusiasms of its makers and stitching them into an ongoing thread of popular music, albeit a thread that only came within sniffing distance of acceptance in the late 60s/early 70s. Steeple presents a clear progression from the first record, Tidings, even going so far as to re-use and develop musical themes; opening shot Silbury Sands takes the spidery yet robust guitar line from Tidings' fragment Season Pt1, and fleshes it out to a commendably portentious and rousingly exciting conclusion. As such it represents the band well - a musical unit that has moved on from Jack Sharps' early bedroom recordings without abandoning the original textures, and managed to mutate over many months hard touring into a ferociously exciting rock band in a classically English tradition. Tracks like Tiny Circle, Painted Cross and Castle Keep showcase surprisingly danceable, circular melodies and harmonies, while the exquisite closing twofer of Banks of Sweet Dundee 1&2 exhibit the delicate touch Wolf People have for traditional folk styles - the recurring flute refrains that pepper the whole record, and the mournful vocals deliver a staunchly authentic-sounding tale of doomed love and patriarchal domination in rural environs, which the band then delight in shredding in a crackling electric denouement and that rarest of things in folk tales; a happy ending. Wolf People are closing in on something magical and rare in modern music, namely a sound that is richly steeped in its' influences but manages to alchemise something new and exciting from the elements it reveres. In label Jagjaguwar, home to such modern alt-rock luminaries as The Besnard Lakes and Black Mountain, Wolf People have found a home that can likely nurture them and let them develop even further - Steeple is such fun that it begs the question, what'll they do next?