Exclusive album stream: Wild Vision by Great Lakes

Great Lakes formed in 1996 in Athens, Georgia, initially aligned with that city’s Elephant 6 collective, but has been based in Brooklyn since 2002.

The band’s fifth album, Wild Vision, comes this Friday on the band’s own label, Loose Trucks. For this new album, founding singer-songwriter-guitarist Ben Crum reconvened the same lineup of musicians who helped him make its predecessor, Ways of Escape: vocalist Suzanne Nienaber, drummer Kevin Shea (Mostly Other People Do the Killing), bassist David Lerner (Ted Leo and the Pharmacists), and keyboardist Joe McGinty (The Psychedelic Furs).

While Great Lakes’ early records traded in a whimsical, light-hearted psychedelia, with their third and fourth albums, 2006’s Diamond Times and 2010’s Ways of Escape, the band gradually gravitated toward more personal songs, with a darker tone. That pattern continues with Wild Vision, a masterfully executed collection of modern country-noir. “Wild Again” is a highlight, with Philip Sterk’s wailing pedal steel circling Crum’s guitar as the song builds to a breathtaking conclusion. At the opposite spectrum, “I Stay, You Go” is an understated, melancholy country ballad graced by a wonderfully weary vocal duet from Crum and Nienaber. “Bird Flying,” “Beauties Of The Way”, and the closer “Shot And MIssed” thrill with howling, minor-key rock jams.

Such pleasures abound on Wild Vision. We could not be more pleased to bring you this exclusive stream today!