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Track Listing: Burns Like A Paper Rose Deathless Sin After Sin Old Dirty Paranoia Secret Handshakes Shiver In The Heat We Speak In Tongues Gone To Dust My Enemy To Whore With Foreign Gods

Having already generated a considerable amount of buzz in UK and Europe, Norwegian quartet Wolves Like Us prepare to unleash their debut full-length effort titled 'Late Love' onto the North American audience. Having started out only last year, the band is fairly new on the scene, but just through reading about their brief history including their European tours with fellow Norwegians Kvelertak, a band I'm a huge fan of, I already developed an expectation in my mind as to what their music would sound like, and after listening to this album a few times, I can safely say that it wasn't far off from what I expected.

"Burns Like A Paper Rose" kicks off the album in a dark rock 'n roll sort of style. It has a very relaxed, easy-going aura to it. The vocals are pretty easy to follow, and the guitar riffs should catch the listener's attention instantly. "Deathless" takes up a notch, a shorter and heavier tune with some very interesting drum parts that give it a pleasantly exotic touch. This is definitely one track on this album with good 'repeat value'. "Sin After Sin" starts off as a slow hard rock tune with a very consistent verse-chorus-verse type song structure, but once the guitar solo kicks in along with more of that exotic drumming as in the previous track, the song comes to life and ends up as a solid tune. "Old Dirty Paranoia" is the shortest track on the album but is quite sludgy and down-tempo, thus offering a change-up from the music thus far, albeit briefly.

"Secret Handshakes" is quite appropriately the centerpiece of the album as it features some of the best guitar work on this album, with excellent vocals to complement it. The rhythm section continues to thrill and ties in brilliantly with the guitar-vocals combination. The album picks up the pace rather rapidly with the next track "Shiver In The Heat", an outright thrash tune very reminiscent of Motorhead, and one that will certainly be enjoyed by one and all. I hope, and I'm sure this will be part of the band's set whenever we get a chance to catch them live. "We Speak In Tongues" doesn't keep up the same kind of speed but definitely manages to keep the quality of music going. "Gone To Dust" offers yet more of those sweet guitar harmonies that will keep the listener sticking to the song like glue. In addition, this song also undergoes some tempo changes unlike most other tunes on the album. "My Enemy" ensures that this album doesn't fade out, but instead continues to be a delight to listen to. "To Whore With Foreign Gods", quite easily the longest track on the album at close to 8 minutes, shows the band in a different light as compared to the rest of the album. They seem to have completely expressed their creativity on this one, resulting in a drawn out, spacey end to an otherwise hard-rock oriented album.

Comparisons to Kvelertak are inevitable, because of the fact that both bands are from Norway, and both play styles of music somewhat similar to each other. But I would say Wolves Like Us are more heavy rock 'n roll rather than 'metal'. Their music is certainly catchier than Kvelertak's, which I don't see as a negative aspect at all. Fans of rock 'n roll, hard rock and stoner rock will find this album to their liking. I would recommend the tracks "Deathless", "Secret Handshakes", "Shiver In The Heat" and "To Whore With Foreign Gods" as those worthy of heavy rotation. Whilst they prepare to tour again with Kvelertak and fellow Norwegians Enslaved plan their tour with Ghost, I hope that all four of these amazing bands come together at some point in the near future to induce mind explosions across the North American continent. As if that thought isn't enough, I am imagining how unreal this album would sound on 180-gram vinyl.

An intriguing composition, highly recommended.

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