The Wake, circa 2020.
Earlier in the year, I unknowingly made a prediction to friends (and eventually on my own YouTube channel) that we were in the beginning of a gothic rock revival of sorts. Just as the 80’s nostalgia had been making its come around, so it was for the 90’s fashions and music to have a return. Our scene is a fickle mistress, and for as much as goth relishes looking backwards for our sounds – we can be outright harsh and unforgiving when it comes to what we like and what we do not. With close to a twenty-five-year gap between full length album releases, how does a band stack up to the heights of those gothic buttresses they once held up? Where does this leave seminal goth rockers The Wake on their long-awaited return?
For the uninitiated, The Wake carved their name into the emerging American gothic rock scene during the late 80’s and stood as sentinels to its sound through a majority most of the 90’s. Hailing from Ohio, vocalist Troy Payne and guitarist Richard Witherspoon crafted a sound built on echoing guitars, moody lyrics and dark, baritone vocals. A staple for many goth compilations throughout the 90’s era, the band delivered tracks like “Nazarene”, “Sideshow” and “Christine” to many a goth club dance floor. These tracks were instant staples that exuded a dark, dangerous and sexy side for the undead nightlife in that era.
The Nine Ways LP, released 1996
After leaving the forefront of the gothic rock scene, Payne and company have quietly worked within the shadows here and there on tracks, releasing 2 singles over the last several years. Otherwise, they’ve been relatively quiet as the scene evolved through the early 2000’s. Like their other 90’s contemporaries, The Wake have recently surprised many within the music community by releasing their first LP since 1996’s The Nine Ways. And while gothic rock has persevered on during their absence, the scene has changed. The merging of goth and industrial club spaces forced the sound played in many a club to adapt to this change, with more electronic acts taking to the forefront and many bands outright copying The Wake’s sound.
But here we are in 2020, a strange year indeed. The 80’s nostalgia, while still popular, has slowly been giving way to the next decade. With that, The Wake has released a new entry into their selective discography, Perfumes & Fripperies. Comprised of ten tracks, the album continues building on the bands signature ethereal atmospherics. Built on echoing guitars drenched in drawn out layers of reverb and chorus, a strong percussion driving the beats and rhythm and Payne’s vocals, The Wake opens the coffin lid and invites us back into their underworld.
The album doesn’t add anything new to the gothic rock genre sound with Perfumes & Fripperies. And that is okay! They’ve already been labelled “Gothic as fuck” and long established themselves as an act to be both appreciated and long often imitated. Here, Perfumes & Fripperies sets the tone out immediately with its opening track, “Daisy”. It’s a slow & dark journey that paints exactly what is to come for the rest of the album. This may be somewhat unappealing to some long-time fans of the band. Some of that can be attributed to youth’s memory, longing for what they believe the band should continue as being. However, the band has grown, evolved and polished their sound. And that is a good thing, because the goth scene has changed much over the years as well.
There’s still an edge here, that really does let you know exactly why the band is “gothic as fuck”. If a Hammer Horror film had modern gothic rock soundtrack, this album would fit that bill neatly. The title track “Perfume & Fripperies” and “Hammer Hall” both capture an extremely sensual and haunted mood, so much so that you’re hard pressed not to smell the burning clove cigarettes and see a fog filled stage and perhaps catch a glimpse of a vampire when listening.
Previously released over the years as singles are updated remixes of “Emily Closer” and “Rusted”. Re-packaged here, both tracks seem to have been cleaned up and do flow nicely with the rest of the album. While “Emily Closer” was released in 2010, it feels natural here, as the band’s sound doesn’t feel stuck in any one point in time – and at the same time, it’s still a reminder of what 90’s goth rock was built on. On the update for “Rusted”, titled “Rusted 20”, Caroline Blind lends her vocals to compliment Payne’s. Simply stated, it works.
This album may end up being divisive for the scene. It may bring in younger listeners or completely turn them off. The flipside is that it has the potential to alienate older, established fans as well. My take is that this album still places them firmly in the “GAF” category, with this album seeming to be a natural progression of where they still would have ended up at this point in time without the extended break. Once touring for bands is safe again, I hope I’m fortunate to see them play in a fog-machine filled venue and we don’t have to wait another twenty-five years for another sampling of their work.
https://www.facebook.com/thewake
Further listening can be found through The Wake’s bandcamp profile.