THE RETURN OF MUSIC THAT MATTERS

JESSE WELLES, SOFIA ISELLA, AND THE WARNING BRING FRESH MEANING TO A SONICALLY STARVING WORLD

AUTHOR-TURNED-IMPASSIONED-NEW-MUSIC-LOVER’S NOTES: As a fired-up child of the 1960’s, I was tricked into believing that protest music as a social force was an important part of a balanced breakfast. That artists like The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Marvin Gaye, Jefferson Airplane, and Sly and the Family Stone were paving the way for music as a galvanizing cultural force, unifying us as it told us deep truths. And rallying us together in the cause of genuine freedom.

Alas, the subsequent decades fell a little short on that front. There were still great artists – there are always great artists – but in a fragmenting world steeped in greed and betrayal, alienation replaced unification as the central theme. Musically, the 90’s were mostly a hopeless howl of rage and pain, half-buried underneath a slick candy surface.

And in this fresh century, with few exceptions, it’s been mostly candy surface. At least in terms of the charts.

But suddenly, there’s a flurry of fresh musical magicians who are blowing my heartsick boomer mind. Why? Because the sounds are soooo fucking charged, sooooo fully alive, sooooo precisely of-this-moment that, God help me, it feels IMPORTANT. Like they’re gonna be seismic in their cultural impact.

And I can feel the ripples in the earth’s crust already, in ways I haven’t felt in ages.

So without further ado, please enjoy these phenomenal forces of nature. All of whom are in their twenties. Are blowing up the internet. And presumably just gettin’ warmed up!

1) JESSE WELLES

Lots of people are dropping the “new Dylan” label on this young man – out in the field, with his acoustic guitar – who seemingly has the perfect song for every fresh nugget of hell our psychotic Pantshitter-in-Chief can disgorge upon us.

But personally, I peg him closer to Tom Lehrer, John Prine, and Country Joe McDonald (who, as leader of the legendary hippie band Country Joe and the Fish, brought the “Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die Rag” to Woodstock). Because the lyrics are brilliant and acerbic, but they’re also hilarious. Laughing through the pain, to the terrible truth.

Bottom line: he’s a true original, unhesitatingly taking his place as one of the all-time great American songwriters. Enjoy these four instant classics, below!

2) SOFIA ISELLA

Working the other end of the staggeringly-brilliant solo artist scale, we find Sofia Isella at her laptop, carving sonic swaths of shamanic transcendence, and then taking them to the live stage in one-woman shows that feel sacred as stigmata on a burning saint.

I don’t know that words can do honor to how astonishing and fearless she is, as a writer and performer. I can invoke prior high priestesses – Kate Bush, Bjork, Laurie Anderson, Diamanda Galas – by way of suggestion. It’s the pantheon of genius to which she clearly belongs.

But I have never seen anyone do what she’s doing, deploying sonic elevated horror movie power to such profound, cathartic healing effect. Her lyrics are blistering blowtorch brilliance. And her music is simply surreal, breathtaking as the soundscape of a dream.

Because she’s being super-cagey at this stage of her dawning career, the following clips are the best I could find. But hang onto your hats. And HOLY FUCK!

THE DOLL PEOPLE (live clip, since the “official” video keeps her all-but-hidden)

3) THE WARNING

Finally, meet las hermanas Villareal: three sisters from Monterrey, Mexico, who religiously followed a childhood dream of rock stardom to become one of the ass-kickingest hard rock bands of the 21st century.

I’m talking about The Warning, a power trio that honest-to-God earns the right by bringing the unbridled power to live shows at packed stadiums worldwide. And though I’ve yet to see them live in person, I’ve watched easily a dozen full concerts shot everywhere from Poland to Sao Paulo. And not just watched, but watched repeatedly.

Why? Because they rock like they fucking invented it, with such palpable passion and joy that it brings tears to my elderly eyes. They rock like they mean it, because they DO mean it, with every speck of their glowing souls.

I gotta tell ya, I could watch drummer Paulina all day. She is a precision dynamo, both ferociously intense and rigorously inventive. And the fact that she sings so gloriously WHILE piledriving the band’s propulsive grooves is a breathtaking thing to behold. (From what I gather, she’s the driving force behind their super-tight songwriting as well.)

Daniela, the eldest, is the lioness with the savage guitar licks, topped only by her jaw-droppingly triumphant vocal roar. She is SUCH a great singer, with SO much power and presence, that it’s only natural the crowd goes wild, connecting in ways most rockers barely dare dream. (Wait till you see how they sing along to her, knowing every word. It is a glorious transaction, indisputably pure.)

And then there’s Alejandra, the youngest, on bass, prowling the stage like a runway model made of thunder. Like all great bass players, it’s easy to underestimate how meticulously she holds the sound together. But man, she is working those five strings like nooooobody’s biznis, with powerhouse riffs in perpetual motion.

But you know what I love most? How totally into it they are. Like there’s nowhere on Earth they’d rather be. To see them rocking out and just smiling at each other is one of my personal happiest places.

In their hands, rock is still the rebellious, deeply yearning music it was always intended to be.

That’s why, right now, they are my favorite working band on Earth.

Check out this incredible concert, from just a couple months back. You could start anywhere, but this one’s particularly well-captured. And then watch the little featurette, which (although pretty typical pr on the one hand) contains wonderful footage of the sisters as little kids, their rock ‘n’ roll destinies already in motion.

This concludes my tribute to Jesse, Sofia, Dany, Pau, and Ale. All of whom make me glad I lived long enough to find out how magnificent they are.

If you have any other new artists you think I might love at this level, please lemme know in the comments below!

And HAVE A BEAUTIFUL DAY, in this long-suffering world we share!

The better we share it, the better we’ll be.

Yer pal in the trenches,

Skipp