The Weight of Whales

Rote predictability is one of the perceived downfalls of local music scenes, but the truth is you never know what you’ll discover when you show up.

Sometimes bands decide to try something different. Sometimes they’re forced to. The latter situation befell The Weight of Whales, a fully-staffed indie rock ensemble forced to improvise when their usual drummer became unavailable for Saturday’s gig at Junctionview Studios’ annual art extravaganza, Agora.

They recruited Curtis Cole from Maza Blaska to handle lightweight percussion duties and decided to attempt a minimal version of the wild, kitchen-sink pop they’ve been spreading around Columbus.

This kind of thing happens relatively often. You go to review Andy Cook and The Wanderloons, and damn it — no Wanderloons! And while playing shorthanded doesn’t necessarily show off the band at its best, it does give them a chance to show how plucky and adaptable they can be.

The Weight of Whales mostly thrived in the face of this challenge. While their recordings portray a band willing to attempt far-flung sounds, their songs survived the transition to a more traditional folk-rock form.

Guitarist Larry Doyle (an associate of fellow junkyard folkie Andrew Graham) still managed to mix things up a bit, running his acoustic through ragged distortion at times and attacking the strings from all sorts of different angles. His inventive playing accented the songs without dominating them.

Not that anything could dominate this music besides Jeff Meyers Jr.’s voice. Minus The Weight of Whales’ usual ruckus, Meyers continued to caterwaul like a less obnoxious version of the guy from Cold War Kids, or perhaps some bizarre Jeff Buckley/Jack White gene splice. His blaring, nasal delivery went down far better than I’d expect from such an abrasive instrument; only on a flamenco-tinged number near the end of the set did his voice become grating, and only because he indulged in some unfortunate screaming.

Cole held his own, too. Though he barely played a thing, he made his little percussive flourishes count. Not bad for filling in on short notice.

Although I’d prefer to see these guys with their lineup intact, witnessing this effective bit of improv was perhaps even more impressive. - Columbus Alive

“I don’t write no love songs!” is the chanted gang vocal style at the end of “Sylvia,” the first track off of The Weight of Whales’ Binding the Twigs EP. Its ramshackle swagger is infectious, coming across like a low-fi version of Queen playing scrappy bedroom anthems.

The lyric can also be considered somewhat of a mission statement for the band.

“When I’m writing lyrics, I don’t really like to write about myself, because I think it’s boring,” says singer Jeff Myers, Jr. “I like to create characters who are in dire straits or have to face some sort of decision. You can do anything with that. You can go anywhere. I think our whole angle is more of a storytelling thing instead of ‘This is my band and this is how I feel today!’”

Binding the Twigs, released in April, was the first installment in a four-EP series collectively titled Pulling the Wool. Biting the Tongue followed in June, and now the band drops Splitting the Hairs on October 1. Each collection of songs reveals a different facet of the Whales’ songwriting style, which oscillates from intricate folk to fuzzed-out blues and many indie touchstones in between.

The Weight of Whales began approximately three years ago with the collaboration of core members Meyers and Larry Doyle hashing out tunes on two acoustic guitars. The decision to name their first serious release Pulling the Wool was born a year and a half ago out of the band’s growing pains. Adding new members to expand their sound was exhilarating but occasionally frustrating.

“Every show at that point was a practice,” said Doyle. “We don’t know what we’re doing. We’re just gonna fake it ’til we make it and pull the wool over everyone’s eyes.”

“People would compliment us, and it’s very flattering,” added Meyers, “but the other bands we played with came off as more professional, like they just had their sh*t together.”

With the help of their friend Reece Alan Arthur, they got to work recording and self-producing tracks old and new, basing the content of each record on the songs’ sonic similarities.

Their hard work paid off: The Weight of Whales – who earlier this year, shared the CD102.5 Day First Dose bill with Alt-J, Little Green Cars and others – can now count themselves among the bands who have their sh*t together. Meyers’ rousing, passionate vocals and Doyle’s dexterous playing are the foundations that color each song with masterful tone and texture. Subtlety and nuance inform soulful tracks like Twigs’ gorgeous “Train Song,” while the volume and drama get cranked for Tongue’s dark, dirty mini-epic “The Butcher.”

“Each [EP] name shows that there’s a level of work and a level of frustration and a level of craziness gone into this thing,” said Meyers. “I guess it’s a testament to all of the late nights we’ve spent by ourselves trying to get this done.” •

– Adam Scoppa - (614) Magazine