Album Of The Week: Wasteland, Baby! — Hozier
It’s been five years since the release of Hosier’s eponymous debut album that was released to great critical acclaim, topping the Irish charts and reaching the Top 10 worldwide. As a result, his latest album, Wasteland, Baby! was undoubtedly released with high expectations from both fans and critics. Whether Hozier is a familiar name to you or not, the song ‘Take Me to Church’ certainly would be — with over 900 million streams on Spotify and becoming up to 9 times platinum, it is his most successful song to date.
With such a successful start to his career, the pressure is on to avoid that “sophomore slump” with his second release. At first glance, the album seems extensively long with fourteen songs; however, given that Hosier has been song writing since the early age of fifteen and given the large gap between his first and second album, it is perhaps not entirely surprising that he has so much to say. With so many songs to play, you would be forgiven for expecting a lack of variety, yet the wide range of instruments employed keeps the engaged until the end.
The opening track ‘Nina Cried Power’, pays homage to musical activists of the past, namely Nina Simone, and featuring vocals from one of her contemporaries, Mavis Staples. The song is melancholy but triumphant that makes it worthy of the artists it celebrates when supported by Hozier’s powerful vocals. Although this is an impressive opener, the second song ‘Almost (Sweet Music)’ on the album is one of the highlights of the tracklist, it paying respect this time to great jazz musicians such as Ray Charles, Louis Armstrong and John Coltrane and more through a number of lyrical references. The song boasts an extremely catchy chorus, with cleverly thought-out lyrics, effectively coupled with unique melodies that are backed throughout by harmonies from a number of different vocalists that can be heard throughout the rest of the album.
‘No Plan’ is another standout song on the album with punchy electric guitar and sultry vocals, whilst ‘Dinner & Diatribes’ also makes use of punchy riffs similar to that of the Black Keys or Black Pistol Fire. This song does however hold a deeper philosophical meaning to it, preaching the message of living in the moment rather than worrying what the new day may bring. His inspiration came from the teaching of two physicist’s teachings, reflecting the time and effort Hozier has put into this project over the 18 months of writing, and showcases his impressive talent as the sole writer on every song. ‘Diner & Diatribes’ also highlights the stellar production quality on show throughout the EP — the instruments are excellently mixed and excellent guitar tones, with an effective strat riff that plays throughout keeping a distinctive rhythm.
With such impressive instrumentation, it can be easy to lose focus on Hozier’s vocals at times. However, there are a number of chilled out acoustic songs that feature towards the end of ‘Wasteland, Baby!’ that show off his song writing expertise — ‘Sunlight’, ‘Would That I’ and the title track ‘Wasteland, Baby!’ are just a few examples of these. While ‘Sunlight’ and ‘Would That I’ are mostly acoustic tracks, they do feature some effective kicks, which really lift the mood of the track. ‘Sunlight’, like many tracks on this album, is a song that could easily be translated onto a festival stage; and luckily we don’t have long to wait. Ultimately, ‘Wasteland, Baby!’ was the sensible choice for the album title, being arguably the best song on the tracklist. It’s an extremely easy track to listen to, and while the rest of the album highlights Hosier’s powerful and soulful vocals, this brings a new much more delicate dynamic to his voice reminiscent of some acoustic pieces from Led Zeppelin III.
Hozier’s latest project features a great deal of variety that offers something for everyone. His voice is certainly one of the most soulful and unique in contemporary music, and combined with the production talent of Rob Kirwan, makes for a satisfying result. His earlier EP ‘Nina Cried Power’ gave us a taste of what Hozier has in store for us after such a long gap, but after having a taste if the whole thing, it was well worth the wait.
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