Sea Wolf

Leaves in the River (Dangerbird)

Into a year of Horses (Band of), Birds (Andrew), and Bears (Panda) dog-paddles Sea Wolf. Baring fangs, Alex Brown Church follows up May’s five-song solo debut, Get to the River Before It Runs Too Low, which led off with “You’re a Wolf,” minor key UK melancholy strummed to California folk. Instant kill. At the lupine heart of September’s full-length, Leaves in the River, “Wolf,” plus its nine other wolves packs all the teenage drama of The River’s Edge, its soundtrack wrapped in 1960s singles-minded romance, the 1970s strum of SoCal, and electro static cling of the 1980s. Dragging the River for a drowned romance, the L.A.-based former Irving bassist leads a band of collaborators as he gently hammers his Marxophone, its steel strings producing the rustle of a mandolin-guitar-zither. The sound separation of cello, piano, guitars makes Arcade Fire’s Neon Bible sound like a perversion. Opening to the title track’s falling rain and nursery piano, love blossoms on a drunk Halloween night and blooms into the doom of “Winter Windows,” a tale of bourbon, an abusive man, and regret. The pluck of “Black Dirt” shovels morbid self-pity couched in straight-up stereophonic sound control. “Song for the Dead” sounds the alarm of the Church’s cold recriminations. May-September romances never fly.

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This article appears in December 28 • 2007.

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San Francisco native Raoul Hernandez crossed the border into Texas on July 2, 1992, and began writing about music for the Chronicle that fall, debuting with an album review of Keith Richards’ Main Offender. By virtue of local show previews – first “Recommendeds,” now calendar picks – his writing’s appeared in almost every issue since 1993.