The debut single is a lost art. These days bands are prone to soft launches, meekly debuting with a demo-like track or two on SoundCloud or Bandcamp before returning with something a little more polished.
So it's always nice to see a band introduce itself with a fully refined, finished product, which is what the Milwaukee quartet Meadowers have done with their debut track "Towers." This is a band that has precisely one song to its name, but the song is so assured, so perfectly conceived, that I already have the full picture of what the group is all about, and I am sold.
With its titanic chiming guitars, the song is rootsy in the secondhand way that Big Thief and Pinegrove are, or that '90s bands like Gin Blossoms and Counting Crows used to be: country in spirit, alternative in execution. And singer/guitarist Ethan Radtke has a remorseful voice filled with implied twang. It's a perfect match for the music.
Stream the track below.