Deaf Havana
It sometimes seems as if British alt-rockers Deaf Havana are embarrassed by the top-five chart success of their biggest release, 2017’s All These Countless Nights. Formed in 2005, their fifth album from last year, Rituals, was a sharp departure from their previous AC/DC-like devotion to recycled, recognizable riffs, offering up a surprisingly hook-laden pop collection that aspired to Aerosmithian rock balladry. It seems like an almost entirely different band from their more hard rock early efforts, Meet Me Halfway At Least (2009) and Fools and Worthless Liars (2011), though the quintet did seem to be embracing their inner anthems a bit with 2013’s Old Souls. The lineup arriving at Soda Bar on May 10 still features songwriter-frontman James Veck-Gilodi and his guitarist brother Matthew, backed by co-founding bassist Lee Wilson, and co-founding drummer Tom Ogden, though they seem to have lost keyboardist Max Britton since recording Rituals. Reportedly, the album was a departure from previous LPs written by Veck-Gilodi on guitar, and instead evolved from mere titles for which songs were then composed on a computer. It’ll be interesting to see how they arrange live renditions of the ambitious tracks from the new album that, on the record, feature the London Contemporary Voice Choir. Perhaps they’ll do a Roger Waters and invite a local choir onstage to accompany them?