Album Review: White Denim - Stiff

It still seems completely incongruous that founding White Denim drummer Josh Block and long-serving guitarist Austin Jenkins left the esoteric rock band to play with rising Texan soul crooner Leon Bridges.

No slight on Bridges at all. Far from it, it's just that one would have previously assumed the two acts only had their home state in common.

Block's avant-jazz leanings in particular underpinned the whole White Denim sound so his absence could have proved fatal. It's admirable that the band's remaining members, frontman James Petralli and bassist Steve Terebecki, have reconvened so quickly and so strongly, adding two versatile replacements: Jeff Olson (drums) and Jonathan Horne (guitar). They've jumped back into the fray with seventh album Stiff. It's the first album where they've deigned to use an outside producer, and Ethan Johns (Ryan Adams, Kings Of Leon, Paul McCartney) certainly brings a clean sound to the table. It eschews the poppier vibes of the last album, Corsicana Lemonade (2013), and crams as many ideas as possible into the soul-tinged goodtime rockers. Songs like the amphetamine-fuelled Holda You (I'm Psycho), heavy rocker Mirrored In Reverse and even the relatively laidback single Ha Ha Ha Ha (Yeah) are all absolutely bursting with riffs and innovative frills.

Such seismic internal changes could have floored a lesser band but White Denim keep the choogle flowing, marching resolutely to the beat of their own drum as always, even if now provided by a different drummer.