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Sep 23, 2011Heavy, lyrically well-tread and packing a mean proto-motorik groove, from start to finish it has an automotive heartbeat with both eyes on the horizon. It is the sound of Wooden Shjips finally bringing it on home.
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Sep 13, 2011Take out the organ, slow down the drums and you might confuse a few songs with Bay Area band Sleep's legendary Dopesmoker album. But it's the things that prevent easy comparison that make Wooden Shjips the kickass band they are.
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Sep 26, 2011West ties in all of the band's strengths for an excellent outlook on what the destiny towards west might feel like and with it, an album of stellar psychedelic rock.
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Sep 14, 2011With West, WS plays post-history psychedelia; it is as necessary -- and freaky -- as anything from the eras that influenced it.
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MojoAug 26, 2011Third album proper for San Fran psych quartet. [Sept. 2011, p. 98]
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Aug 15, 2011They're one of only a tiny handful of bands currently using retrospective influences from the past to create something relevant and unique for the present and beyond.
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Aug 12, 2011It's the unrelenting power of the two-chord drones, though, that is the real draw here, bass and drums throbbing hard enough to add a real heartbeat to songs that might otherwise seem insubstantial enough to melt away. It's enervating, sunbaked and, for all that, rather thrilling.
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Aug 12, 2011Unexpectedly, these star-sailors are tripping the light, fantastically.
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Aug 12, 2011Although just seven songs long, the third album from San Francisco psychedelic rockers Wooden Shjips is a remarkably dense, intense affair.
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Sep 20, 2011The greasy, hopped-up grooves of "Lazy Bones" and "Looking Out" aren't dramatic departures from West's overall drone-heavy aesthetic. But they do a lot to separate Wooden Shjips from similar bands, like the Black Angels and Dead Meadow.
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Aug 25, 2011Even with its increased focus on classic-rock virtues, the album isn't really a collection of riffs and wails and choruses; it's more a muscular sort of vibe-out-- badass ambient music, if you will.
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MagnetNov 11, 2011If the stoner rock of the Atomic Bitchwax and Nebula crashed, with care and caution, into Swervedriver and the Doors, you'd have West. [#81, p. 60]
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Sep 23, 2011With West, Wooden Shjips is just breaking in its new soles--and hitting its stride.
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Sep 14, 2011If you're fording a desert highway at dawn, these songs will get you across. They're consuming and expansive, steady and constant.
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Sep 13, 2011Besides embracing improved recording and production, the album stands out in their catalog for containing a strong roster of outstanding songs, not a 98-pound weakling in the bunch.
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Sep 12, 2011All told, West might repel listeners with short attention spans, but with a bit of patience, its coherence pummels any monotony.
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Sep 12, 2011Wooden Shjips shoot straight into that barely circulating heart of rhythm and blues and reopen a vein of noise that it is difficult not to pump along with.
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Sep 7, 2011At times it can become something of an amorphous blob, with songs blending into one another, but the highlights of Home and Flight ensure that there's something tangible to hang on to.
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Aug 23, 2011The first Shjips album to be recorded in a proper studio, with an engineer, West is Wooden Shjips' fullest exploration of these tensions to date, and sees the band stepping up their game in every aspect.
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The WireAug 17, 2011There's no point chasing diminishing returns on a four-track, and the buffed-up West is a kick worth revisiting. [Aug 2011, p.63]
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Aug 12, 2011As long as he keeps on being this magnificent, Mr Ripley can be as avaricious as he damn well pleases.
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Oct 6, 2011There are certainly moments of well-crafted, spaced-out music, but West is not as overwhelming as it could be. And to be honest, even after several listens, all the songs in West still sound pretty much the same.
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UncutAug 18, 2011More rock music should be this reduced and addictive--but they'll have to think long and hard about self-parody some time soon. [Sep 2011, p.105]
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Q MagazineAug 16, 2011Mission statement from feted San Franciscan droners. [Sept. 2011, p. 119]
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Under The RadarAug 16, 2011It's difficult to imagine Wooden Shjips recording an album that presents more of a psych rock statement of purpose than West. [Oct. 2011, p. 83]
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Aug 12, 2011The Shjips' mesmeric approach reaches its apogee on "Flight", whose rolling groove is streaked with cascading contrails of echoey, double-tracked space-guitar.
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Sep 13, 2011What was once an exciting examination of a seldom-explored corner of rock and roll has become a listless, mechanical affair.