The Woods

Sleater-Kinney | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 24, 2005)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sub Pop
• ASIN: B0008FPIOU
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (102 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,561 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #2 in Music > Alternative Rock > Hardcore & Punk > Riot Grrl
  • #24 in Music > Alternative Rock > American Alternative > General
  • #86 in Music > Alternative Rock > Hardcore & Punk > Punk

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

After its most prolonged absence from the recording studio, Sleater-Kinney has reloaded with a smoldering rock and roll record that rivals John Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band and Nirvana’s In Utero in terms of unexpectedness. It is a 180-degree proclamation to the album which came before it. Producer David Fridmann (Weezer, Flaming Lips) coaxed the Portland, OR trio to retool its approach to making music. The results are startling and far and away the most collaborative, experimental and risky in the band’s seven-record career. Corin Tucker’s supreme guttural form is on display from the lead-off track "The Fox"--a would-be children’s tale overridden by crunching power chords and drummer Janet Weiss’s battering percussion. The Woods tugs on your ear musically and stabs at your heart lyrically on riff-wielding jaunts "Wilderness," "Modern Girl" and "Rollercoaster." The live-in-one-take, 11-minute blockbuster "Let’s Call It Love" unleashes Carrie Brownstein’s foray into guitar-solo psychedelic. Haven’t heard Sleater-Kinney yet? Try Dig Me Out and work your way forward. Already on board? Find a steady chair, feel your ears bleed and watch your speakers disintegrate. --Scott Holter --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description

The Portland trio's first album for Sub Pop. A much more riff-heavy affair, this album finds the band pushing their sonic/compositional boundaries, while maintaining their identity. The limited edition version (25,000) comes with a bonus DVD featuring five performances of new songs recorded live in Portland. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

66 of 77 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Venture into "The Woods", but be forewarned..., May 25, 2005

By 

Alfonso Mangione "Loves the three Rs: Readin'... (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Woods (Bonus Dvd) (Audio CD)

Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Corin Tucker who wanted to be our Joey Ramone. But Sleater-Kinney's six studio albums, while winning over critics from coast to coast, have landed the girls on surprisingly few bedroom doors. So what are three riot grrrls to do on number seven?

Crank the amps up to 11.

"The Woods" is a primal scream of an album, a cathartic burst of animal fury, with angry harmonies and growling guitars that sound like they've just come back from disobedience school. This isn't "One Beat", it's many beats, sometimes coming together in surging pulses of song, sometimes jangling against one another in an angry mess of cacophonous sludge. "If you're here 'cause you want to be entertained/Please go away," Corin sings on "Entertain", a well-aimed but slightly late kick at info-tainment, reality TV, 80s soundalike bands, and the endless run of nostalgia-based VH1 shows. (During last year's media orgy of 10-years-without-Nirvana stories, a critic lamented that Kurt Cobain never lived to write a song about reality TV. If he had, it might have sounded a lot like "Entertain".) It's a great summary of what superstardom looks like in 2005, and a declaration that the girls want no part of it.

No, they're after something else entirely, something raw and powerful and real, and if it occasionally feels like they're lost in "The Woods", you have to give them mad props for getting off the beaten path, with an album that confounds fan expectations in a manner reminiscent of "Monster" or "In Utero". Give them credit, too, for getting where they're going in the end; some of these songs are among the best they've written. "Jumpers" leaps off the disc on the first listen; it's a beautiful, harrowing, and angry suicide note as convincing as anything this side of Nick Drake. "Steep Air" is great, a wonderful guitar melody sludged up enough just enough to make it interesting, but then comes "Let's Call it Love", a great song that might have been even better if the super-heavy guitars weren't crushing the vocals. At times like this, David Fridmann's production gets a little annoying. Still, for the most part, it works--he gets the anger and energy of the group's live performances onto CD, and the segue from that song to the excellent closer "Night Light" is one of the highlights of this excellent album.

If you're just getting into the group, "One Beat" or "Dig Me Out" might be a safer place to start, but casual fans and die-hards (like myself) will still have a whole lot of fun exploring "The Woods." (If Amazon let me, I'd give it four-and-a-half stars.) Anyway, Corin, if you're listening, you don't have to be our Joey Ramone, or our Kurt Cobain. Just keep pouring your heart and soul into albums like this, and we'll all be living happily ever after.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Let's call it TRANSFORMATIONAL!, June 30, 2005

By 

Bill Schwabenland (seattle) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Woods (Bonus Dvd) (Audio CD)

THIS is the band that Sleater-Kinney was always destined to become.

I have been seriously listening to serious rock and roll since I was 5 years old - that's over 45 years - and I am not prone to exaggeration or hyperbole. This IS the GOOD STUFF! I have been listening to Sleater-Kinner off and on for about 3 years and have always suspected that they were capable of generating this kind of energy. But it seems to have all come together in the new SubPop release "The Woods".

First, a few disclaimers: (1) I consider S-K to be a "local" band (2) I have always liked the name (3) female drummers rule - Janet Weiss rules them all (4) I have a weakness for very strong-voiced female vocalists (e.g. I am excited by throaty, bluesy, hard rock vocals as performed by Janis Joplin, Grace Slick, Melissa Ethridge, or Rickie Lee Jones). Ironically, I am not into lyrics - it is the fact that these vocalists add to the music with their voices and do not detract from it - that I like them.

All that being said, it is the raw energy in the drums and guitar work that put this album over the top. Don't get me wrong, Corin Tucker's vocals have plenty of energy - there were parts that reminded me of a cross between early Grace Slick (i.e. before Jefferson Airplane even) and Geddy Lee. But it is the guitar work and the presentation/arrangement of the songs that is transformational. For me, the record is building throughout until arriving at the last two songs: Track 9: "Let's Call It Love" and Track 10: "Night Light". There are several significant highlights along the way but listening to Let's Call It Love was akin to a spiritual experience for me.

I have used the word "transformational" several times and will use it some more because this album is transformational on several levels - both for the band and for me as a listener. There has been the obligatory discussion in the local print media, online, and on the local alternative rock stations about how this album represents a transformation for Sleater- Kinney as well as for Subpop. But that is not what I am talking about. I would like to predict that this album will be as transformational for S-K as Jimmy Hendrix's performance at the Monterey Pop Festival was supposed to have been. For me, as a listener, this album represents a return to the rock and roll energy that I experienced when I "came of age" as a hard rock listener in the 1968-1971 time frame - through the magic of San Francisco at the height of Bill Graham;s Filmore West,, Woodstock, the advent of Led Zeppelin, Cream, The Who, Big Brother, Jefferson Airplane, Jimmy Hendrix, Frank Zappa, Deep Purple, and Black Sabboth. My musical tastes have evolved and I have recently enjoyed Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age, Audioslave, The Black Keys, and Modest Mouse - as well as an Indie "Power Blues" trio fronted by Sonny Moorman. These all give me enjoyment and are, at times, even exciting because of their energy and raw rock and roll. But this S-K album has reached back through time and tied it all together; filling a void that I did not realize was so large. It also transported me back in time to the time of those other bands that I mentioned from my youth. The 3rd track "What's Mine Is Yours"took me back to those unimaginable west coast concerts of the late `60s. The 4th track "Jumpers" somehow reminded me of the Bossa Nova craze of that time period even though it is not a Bossa Nova. (I hope I am not scaring anyone with this retro, prehistoric, talk - these were experiences that I had and were only meant to provide some perspective on the extent to which this album impressed me.)

When I first listened to the Queens of the Stone Age album "Songs for The Deaf" with Dave Grohl a few years ago I said "This is the band that the Foo Fighters COULD have been", meaning that they were not hampered by ballads and played only songs with high energy. Even Audioslave feels obligated to water down their sound with the occasional ballad although until today they were probably my favorite band. But when I listened to "The Woods", I knew that this was the band that S-K was destined to become. It all comes to a head in the 11 minute long (!) Track 9: "Let's Call It Love". From the opening guitar, which would make a young Ozzy Osborne fronted Black Sabboth proud, the guitar work in this song builds and builds until. I swear to God, in the 6th minute of the song Carrie Brownstein is channeling Jimmy Hendrix. And this leads to a finish that would make a young Pete Townsend quite proud. Just when you think "this can't get any better", the album segue's into Track 10 : "Night Light" which is perhaps not as personally spiritual as "Let's Call It Love", is still a fantastic finish to an album that continues to surprise throughout.

While this is the band that S-K was always destined to become, I can only imagine where they can go from here. I can't wait to find out. I just hope that they get the attention and the following that they deserve from the iPod generation that buys one track at a time and might miss the masterpiece that this album is as a whole. Frankly, it sucks that they are only opening for The White Stripes next month at The Gorge - S-K should be the headliners! I hope they're still kicking out the jams when Im 90.

UPDATE: 10/29/05 Some time has passed and I've had a chance to reflect more on this album. I have to say that I do listen to Audioslave much more than this album (both Audioslave albums) and if I were forced to pick between those albums and this one, I would probaby let this one go. And I have "rediscoverd" Primus and a number of Les Claypool's side projects which are also on my "top ten" for recent listening along with Ugly Casanova. However, this album still retains it initial appeal and excitement when I am in the mood for raw, driving rock energy. It is right in there with my Black Keys CDs (about once per week) and well worth the investment if that is what you aree looking for.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great, but it's not 'One Beat', May 25, 2005

By 

Gypsy - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Woods (Audio CD)

As much as I LOVE S-K, i just can't quite bring myself to give this 5 stars. They are still one of the best examples of rock music ever, but this album just doesn't quite measure up to 'One Beat' and 'Call the Doctor.' I was disapointed that I couldn't hear COrin and Carrie's screaming vocals so much because of the high distortion, spescially on 'The Fox,' which has some really awesome lyrics. If you are just starting to learn about Sleater-Kinney I would recommend One Beat instead.
Still, this album has it's good points, the songs are a refreashing break from the everyday pop-punk that inundates the punk genre. These strong women REALLY know how to rock.