Chris DeLine

Recently wrapping up production on the group’s debut album with the help of Gred Fidelman (Johnny Cash, Red Hot Chili Peppers) and Greg Gordon (Oasis) The Wildbirds seem to already have already a jump on things; one might say they’ve already become the most successful band ever to come from Appleton, Wisconsin.

There’s a wild sense of recklessness in the band’s songs which makes a whole lot of sense considering many of them were written in the woods of Northern Wisconsin. Says vocalist/rhythm guitarist Nicholas Stuart, “We’d try to write in the basements and garages of Appleton, where we live, but the cops always came and shut us down.” He continues, “So we’d take a week off here and there, and head up to Matthew’s (Reetz) cabin up near the Upper Peninsula. It’s on a secluded lake, and you have to drive fifteen miles in on logging trails. We’d hunt and fish for our food up there; we didn’t have to touch our instruments if we didn’t want to, and we’d play until six in the morning if we did.” In a time when synth-conducive sounds are every bit a part of the modern rock band as a rhythm section congratulations to The Wildbirds for playing the kind of rock that made rock n’ roll what it is today.

[This post was first published by Culture Bully.]