WRAY: SOUTHERN SHOEGAZE CHARM

Hailing from the up and coming progressive music scene of Birmingham, AL, Wray took the stage at Arlene’s Grocery last week, treating the crowd to a carefully constructed set of power gaze music. The trio, consisting of David Brown, David Swatzell and Blake Wimberly, gave a rather introverted performance enveloping the audience in their music with precise execution. What the band lacks in stage antics, they more than make up for with intricately layered songs like “Bad Heart” that can fill the room with notes seemingly hanging in the air above their fans heads and making the hairs on your arm stand on end. The vocals have a Morrisey-esque quality that wind their way in and out of the rolling guitar solos while the drums pound their way through every song. This band is not a high-octane group–Wray prefers to impress you with their instrumental prowess and set-building skills, evident in the finale which boiled down to the trio playing the same trancing notes in succession until it became almost too much to bear. And then they were gone. A soft “thank you” spoken gently into the microphone and Wray slipped back into the NYC shadows off to their next gig.

Article by: Hannah Soule