Local lo-fi garage rock outfit Headwinds bites off just the right amount to chew on latest release A.I. To be honest, the five-track EP, released in January, took a few listens to grow on me. The opening song “Desire” wastes no time introducing your ears to distanced reverbed vocals, psych-inducing guitars and punchy drums—although, its outro is drawn out longer than we expected it to be. But “Heavy Metal Blue” is the standout jammer. Its deeply detuned and slowed sound punches you in the gut while the guitar distortion feels like an alien that might take over your brain ... and before you know it, it’s cut short and we’re catapulted into another headspace on the acoustic “Melody.”
Recorded at The Alamo by Häxa’s Elias Gil and mastered by Shelco Garcia, A.I.’s tracks are digitized from a 1960s-era reel-to-reel tape recorder. The vintage gear does little for the audio’s clarity, but adds to its generally raw aesthetic. All the vocals are live takes, and according to Gil, the vocal effects were made impromptu during recording. The machine itself picked up the sound, rather than relying on a standalone mic.
“Because of this, you can hear the old machine clunking away through the entirety of the recordings,” Gil says. Once you’ve learned that about that recording process, what seemed like a musical gaffe upon first listen becomes a part of the record’s appeal.
A.I.’s imperfections remind me that rock and roll isn’t meant to be polished. That’s one of the best things about Headwinds—they keep their sound true to themselves.
And if you get a chance to catch them performing at one of our beloved dive bars, you’ll want to take a peek into their controlled madness. I’ll never get tired of seeing frontman Gady Miguel Monterroso Calix smash his guitar to pieces at their live gigs. As the set begins to close, he drops to his knees and frantically begins twisting his pedal’s knobs while strumming the guitar’s steel strings, creating an unrelenting noise from the dirty floor.
As Gil puts it, “It ain’t pretty, but it’s rock n roll.”
Headwinds linktr.ee/Headwindslv
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