Seattle tends to find something it’s good at and stick with it, musically speaking. We all know that Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden brought grunge rock to the forefront in the ’90s. In more recent years, the popularity of the alternative/folk/rock sounds of Death Cab For Cutie, Fleet Foxes and The Head And The Heart have reaffirmed the city’s copious musical contributions.
The Emerald City is offering us a horse of a different color, however, with the soul-saturated pop/rock of relative newcomer, Pickwick. Unlike other contemporary artists from the Pacific Northwest, Pickwick channels the persuasive groove of the ’60s and ’70s as well as the rhythmic pop presence of the ’80s, to arbitrarily create melodies less rustic in character and more velvety in texture than the rest of their Seattle music cohort.
In the last year, the six piece male ensemble, led by the robust vocal stylings of Galen Disston, has released four EPs – “Myths, Vol. 1-3″, as well as “Covers/Split” with fellow Seattle locals, Concours d’Elegance.
For many bands, the vocals tend to tuck carefully into the folds of the instrumentation, creating a comfortable amalgamation for the ears. But for Pickwick, by far one of the most rousing aspects of their work is that Disston’s voice manages to separate itself wholly from the instrument composition. Instead of blending into a single entity, his booming vocals confound your initial expectations while the effervescent melodies, heavy on the tambourines and shakers, bubble over in your eardrums – making it damn near impossible not to be engulfed unknowingly by their sound.
Disston’s beguiling vocals have the “blue-eyed soul” of Steve Winwood’s ’86 magnum opus, “Higher Love“ and the “new wave” semblance of Squeeze’s “Tempted“ Couple that with their jive-imbued instrumentation, evocative of ’60s classics like The Soul Survivor’s “Expressway To Your Heart“ and Wayne Fontana And The Mindbenders’ “Game Of Love“, and you end up with a track like “Hacienda Motel” – the first song that Pickwick composed in their newly carved melodic niche.
Unless you are fortunate enough to live within the general vicinity of Washington, chances are that you have yet to have the opportunity to experience Pickwick’s dynamic sound live and in color. Luckily, the gentlemen will be recording their first full-length record this winter, and plan to tour extensively throughout the country to support its release in the new year.
Until then, feast your ears on this cornucopia of reinvented soul. Then stream a couple of their other choice numbers below.
Pickwick – Blackout by ListenBeforeYouBuy
