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Miles Patzer didn’t necessarily plan on writing a song that Monday. He certainly didn’t intend on starting a whole new album cycle. In fact, as the guitarist/vocalist for indie-Americana band HOSTS put it, “I hadn’t written a song with any kind of release in mind for about five years.”
Two words changed that: “Wade Low.”
They “just popped out one day,” he recalled. “I wanted to describe a feeling of getting in almost too deep, right before you ‘drown.’ The song felt too right and just poured out of me; and in the span of one Monday afternoon, I decided this song would lead the way into a new full-length record.”
We’re a little more than a week away from the release of that LP, Wade Low, which comes out June 9. In the meantime, we’re happy to have the title track to chew on as a Milwaukee Music Premiere.
The fact we can call the song that is a curious tale in itself that started in Nashville, where HOSTS first played together in 2014. The universe conspired to bring founding members Patzer, guitarist Tyson Allison, bassist Brian Tapola and drummer Aaron Reinke to Milwaukee, but Music City’s fingerprints are still all over this song and album that shares its name.
The band put “Wade Low” — and the full LP — in the capable hands of Drew Long, Patzer’s college roommate in Nashville who has since worked with the likes of Chris Stapleton, Judah & The Lion and Houndmouth. “We wanted to reconnect some of that Southern flare here in Milwaukee,” the band shared with us, an effort furthered by the record being mastered in Nashville by Edsel Holden (who has done the same for artists like Hovvdy and Katy Kirby).
The result on “Wade Low” is a strummy affair punctuated by Patzer’s drawl and this underlying feeling that the song wants to break free of its restraints but can’t quite find an opening — until the final 45 seconds. At that point, frustration and desperation boil over as Patzer lets loose a guttural shout that’s as cathartic for the listener as it seems to be for the singer.
It’s an emotionally melodic journey you can take by hitting the “Listen” button at the top of the page or by tuning in to 88Nine and keeping an ear open for “Wade Low” in our playlist. HOSTS will also take their tunes around the Milwaukee area, playing live June 9 at Linneman’s for an album-release show, June 17 as the headliners for Guitar City Days at Raised Grain Brewing, and Sept. 14 to wrap up this year’s Third Space Presents concert series.
