Wavves’ V.

My ALDS notes and predictions are up now for Insiders, and I’ll have a post up on Eddy Julio Martinez and several other Cuban and Dominican prospects I saw this week in Santo Domingo. I also held a chat earlier today.

Wavves first came to my attention with their 2013 album Afraid of Heights, which featured the song “Sail to the Sun” and encapsulated their sort of slightly obnoxious southern California pop-punk style of music, but also showed what I interpreted as a reluctance to become too accessible. Songs with big hooks would often turn dissonant as lead singer X strained his voice to scream a final chorus or verse, which I don’t usually mind but which limits the group’s potential audience for no appreciable reason. (I’ve never understood screaming in pop-oriented music; unless you’re doing extreme metal, what’s the point?)

On V, their fifth album, the band has dispensed with the more obnoxious elements of their music and crafted an album that seems more mature and is certainly more likely to find commercial success, thanks also to a half-dozen short, hook-driven pop-rock songs. Opener “Heavy Metal Detox” is already getting some radio play, sounding almost like the Descendants have come back to their heyday. Wavves also mix in some different guitar tones, leading off “Way Too Much” with a Queens of the Stone Age riff that doesn’t resurface till the chorus. After the album’s first track asks “why does my head hurt?” we get a whole song on that topic with “My Head Hurts,” one of many songs where the lyrics reference alcohol abuse, something lead singer/founder Nathan Williams has fought in the past.

V avoids the monotony that plagues a lot of punk-pop records (coughGreenDaycough) in two ways: the songs are short, and there are a lot of small production changes or different guitar tones that layer a veneer of variety over songs that otherwise might seem too similar. Even something as small as a little distortion on an acoustic guitar in “Redlead,” probably the most complex song on the album, becomes a needed change of pace.

There’s still some of their rougher-edged former selves on the album; closer “Cry Baby” starts out with the kind of off-key shriek that was all over their previous record, leading into a song that’s heavier on the punk and lighter on the pop. The overall result of V works fine without that kind of material, however; it sounds like a band that’s grown up and accepted that its core competence is churning out catchy, short, punk-inflected songs.