Formed by Madison Velding-VanDam and Jason Gates in 2017, and with the addition of Yasmeen Night in 2021, The Wants’ sound is defined by the push and pull of its members’ processes: Floating rhythms upheaving grounded songwriting, pulsing synths overwhelming live instrumentation. Their new record, Bastard, is an evolution of many of the seeds planted in their debut record, Container (2020), with a refined sense of acerbic emotional urgency and sonic experimentation.
…Opener ‘Void Meets Concrete’ creates urban imagery in the mind’s eye with its stuttering, twitchy electronica; the echoey vocal and reverberating metallic sonics heighten the tension, which ends abruptly. This imagery continues on ‘Data Tumour’ – spikier and with…