Monday 5 February 2018

Sereias + Wand - part 2: Wand, Hard Club, Porto, 02.02.2018.




words: Guilherme Lucas; photos: Raquel Pinheiro


Wand’s concert, in essence, an American Psychedelic Rock band (their music also denotes other different and heavier genres within Rock) was, as far as I am concerned, a bit lukewarm, and underperformed my expectations. It was a concert with two distinct energies and at two different tempus, with their new material, titled “Plum” released late 2017,  much to “blame”, and that, in my opinion, is the least interesting of the whole of the band’s discography. It is a little monotonous, in same parts even boring, without much flame. However, understand that Wand have great songs in all their discography, looking like a band that seems to invest more in a melting pot of different music genres than choosing a single path. Therefore, they are a band of different registers, which does not mean they are bad. Even because the band is good and has some truly excellent songs, offering a repertoire with great quality to please everybody. But live, performing their most recent songs, those different energies show a lot. when playing their most recent songs. They both enter a far-fetched slightly boring area on a Psychedelic level as well as, right after, explode with amazing and more direct songs, some in a deliciously Surf register, remembering a little Pixies/Muse. Essentially, the band lives from its mentor, founder singer/guitarist Cory Hanson, a nice guy that truly loves Porto, going as far as saying it is the most beautiful city in the world (and he does not say it ironically). Master of a brilliant voice timbre and a great guitarist at every level, it on him that all attention falls upon. In that sense, it is difficult to imagine the rest of the band without him. I think that, on the whole, the majority of the audience, that had Hard Club Sala 2 at nearly capacity, liked the band’s performance. The hampered encore, when most people had already left the room, should had been better “timed”. In short: Wand are a good band with things worthy being heard. They have gems, and (to me) that is what matters.




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