Tractor Presents: The Lonely Wild with Special Guests

With songs that blaze through the dusty American West, quickly-rising L.A. quintet The Lonely Wild effortlessly combine a bombastic rock sound and cinematic western nuance with lyrics that touch on political corruption, greed, and present-day social discord.

The Lonely Wild recently enjoyed a string of high-profile appearances at the Silverlake Jubilee, Make Music Pasadena, and Echo Park Rising festivals, a month-long residency at the acclaimed Satellite (formerly Spaceland), and sold-out shows with Damien Rice & Laura Marling at the Hotel Cafe, Lord Huron at The Echo, John Doe (from X) at The Echo, and The Elected at The Echo. They've also gotten airplay on the Los Angeles radio stations KCRW, KXLU, and KCSN, as well as Nashville's Lightning 100. Taking nothing for granted, The Lonely Wild aren't resting on their laurels with these recent achievements, but rather staying true to the work ethic that got them there and keeping themselves hungry to continue the journey that began years before.

In the fall of 2009, singer Andrew Carroll witnessed the death of his grandmother who had lost her battle with drug addiction, watched his band of six years dissolve, and at last married his longtime love. To cope with these moments of pain and bliss, Carroll began writing songs on solo, acoustic guitar. He would wake with a melody in his head, and finish a song by the end of that day. “It was a very liberating way to write,” he says, “Coming from my prior band experience, where songs were totally dependent on the collaboration of all the members, it was nice to be able to write for myself. It allowed me to be more direct and honest.”

But Carroll soon realized that his songs demanded a broader palate than one guitar and one voice. He wanted to create a sepia-toned world, a cracked landscape, a wind-torn desert. Enter multi-instrumentalist Ryan Ross, whose soaring trumpet and rumbling bass and organ bring drama and tension, guitarist Andrew Schneider, whose blistering twang colors the songs with his 60’s psychedelic-western flare, and drummers Edward Cerecedes, and later Dave Farina, whose thunderous tribal beats propel the songs soul-shaking precision. Jessi Williams’ lilting croon solidifies their signature sound built around male-female vocal harmonies.

Their first EP, “Dead End,” launched them on a national tour, earned them airplay on college radio staples, KXLU and KUT, and critical success. Of the EP, The L.A. Times writes, “[The Lonely Wild] rustles up rustic guitar pop that’s equal parts sweet harmonies and power chord bombast.” Kevin Bronson of Buzzbands L.A. says, “[Dead End] is five songs of aching Americana that will stay with you long after you’ve cried in your beer.” And Beat Crave writes, “The Lonely Wild have a sound like no other [...] the inexplicable heart and soul they put in their music is sure to have you hooked.”

Coming off the success of “Dead End,” The Lonely Wild headed to The Hangar Studios in Sacramento where they would live, eat, and sleep for a week, to record their first full-length album. Midway through the sessions, they woke to the devastating news that their head engineer’s father had died, forcing him to leave. The fate of the record seemed uncertain. A day short and with a new engineer, The Lonely Wild worked consecutive sixteen, eighteen and twenty-four hour days to produce an album filled with gut-wrenching emotion, fragile beauty, and explosive energy — a band on the brink of delirium. “It was a true labor of love,” Carroll says, “and a sheer force of will, that allowed us to finish this record. We all knew it was the most important artistic statement we had ever made, so we had to pull out all the stops.”

The result is the achingly beautiful album "The Sun As It Comes", which is slated for release in early 2013.