We Are Wolves - Total Magique

Total Magique is the second album of the Montreal indie rock band, We Are Wolves. First off, I'd like to say that this band is totally badass. Just listen to the name, "We Are Wolves." Shit, wolves. That's awesome, you don't fucking mess with wolves. Second, the music is awesome. And third, the record company they're signed to is called "Dare To Care Records." I don't even have to tell you how cool that is. But let's gown down to the nitty-gritty. A couple things stood out for me on this album. Apart from having some sweet triforces on the cover, the first thing I noticed was that this band combines post-punk sounding beats and singing really well with electronic sound and synthethizers . The songs on this album really pump you up give you that classic rock adrenaline rush that makes old people and dads get up and play air guitar. In a sense, I feel like it could even be a more modern version of that. The singer has this great almost distorted and grungy feeling that blends great with the synthy guitar and drums. Singer and bassist Alexander Ortiz's vocals just seem to flow behind the bass and synth in this wonderful soupy mix of punk and electronic,most notably in songs like "Teenage, Bats & Anthropology" and "Magique." In every song the intensity level rises and just gets better. There's nothing worse then a cool song that starts out and you're like "Hey this sure is catchy." And then just drops and gets boring and repetitive for four minutes. Total Magique is so far from that. The songs start out catchy and then keep getting added to, which makes for great replay value. Okay so far we're good. But now here comes the things that weren't so hot. Although they're electronic punk style works for the most part, a lot of the punkish singing seems a little cliché and contrived. In songs like "Fight and Kiss" which, in my opinion, is not the best song on the album, sounds too much like a 10th grade punk garage band trying to be uber badass. In other words, some of the singing sounds like an early 2000s punk band that has songs all about getting back at ex girlfriends and jocks. Not that it's really that bad, I think that overall the vocals are superb and creative. But if you look hard enough, you can find something pretty gay about the singing in just about any song. So overall, Total Magique is an awesome album full of chronic bass-synth combos that sure do deliver. I'd recommend you pick it up whether you're more of a punk fan or electronic fan or both or whatever. Total Magique has some great, catchy songs that I think most will enjoy.



-Charlie