Von Wildenhaus - Everything in Flower (2020)
On a sopping wet night on October 21, 2022, I went to a show at Bad Bar for the first time. The lineup was Fungal Abyss, Ben Von Wildenhaus, and Loose Wing. For whatever reason, my initial impression wasn’t much, but later on with the right lens and a second listen to their 2020 release Everything in Flower did it all start to come together. They describe themselves as “guitar noir litewave psychotica” and “easy listening for demons”, but it’s more on the psychedlic pop experimental end than the heavier psychedelic doom (thankfully). I like Drones, but the song Working on My Novel speaks to me as I have been working on a novel for far too long, in some shape or another.
Von Wildenhaus is from SEATTLE, WA. Billie Bloom, vocals. Ben von Wildenhaus, guitar, vocals. Caleb Thompson, acoustic guitar, vocals. Andru Creature, rhythm, contraption, Aaron Harmonson, bass, synth, recordings. Jon Sampson, saxophones, pianos. … Von Wildenhaus, hailing from the fog-drenched Pacific Northwest, is an apocalyptic avant-pop lounge act, a bizarro rock & roll band as comfortable working in American folk idioms as covering Klaus Nomi. Ben Von Wildenhaus leads a cast of shadowy conspirators in conjuring this darkly sonorous music, most notably, the spectral presence of singer Billie Bloom, who delivers ecstatic melodies with fearless and riveting devotion that have found admirers in The Quietus and Iggy Pop.
