Until now, I could think of only one interesting thing that's come from Baltimore, MD. John Waters hails from there and as some of you may know his blue movies are stabbing satire that at times borders on mental illness. The Wilderness can now provide the proper serious soundtrack to those grotesque parodies of suburbia. This is a band who perhaps would be legends today if this record was made in Divine's Reagan-era.

The Wilderness is an artrock band with a sound as deeply indebted to 80s Bunnymen post-punk as to the 90s Galaxie 500 post-rock. The vocals here sound as if BSP's Yan is covering a Lydon PiL sing/speak anthem. My first impression is this vocal style isn't as warm as that description might suggest. As the album progresses, however, the heavy drum beat begins to accentuate the vocal style. The s/t debut has a rather tribal feel to it. Add the more familiar swirling neo-psychadelia guitars and it's an odd recipe for success. My feeling is that listeners with a penchant for "originality" will very much enjoy this record, and those of us with slightly more mainstream tastes will have to work a little harder but that it'd be worth the effort. 8.0/10.