Since their formation in Cincinnati back in 1986, The Afghan Whigs — currently Greg Dulli (vocals, guitar), John Curley (bass), Patrick Keeler (drums), multi-instrumentalist Rick Nelson and newest member, Blind Melon’s Christopher Thorn (guitar) — have a long-held reputation for refusing to play by convention: During the flannel and plaid of the early 90s grunge era, the members of The Afghan Whigs stood apart from their contemporaries for wearing suits and for being more likely to slide into a soulful groove than a power chord-driven riff.
Reuniting after an 11 year hiatus in 2012, the JOVM mainstays released two critically applauded albums, 2014’s Do to the Beast and 2017’s In Spades, that found the band writing and recording music that furthered their story together, while pushing their sound in new directions.
Slated for a September 9, 2022 release through Royal Cream/BMG, the JOVM mainstays’ ninth album — and first in five years — the Christopher Thorn co-produced How Do You Burn? reportedly picks up on the sound and appraoch of 2014’s Do to the Beast and 2017’s In Spades and pushes it even further. With the pandemic forcing Greg Dulli to abandon plans to support his critically applauded solo album Random Desire, the band began working on How Do You Burn? in September 2020 and continued over the next 14 months in remote recording sessions: Dulli, Thorn and Keeler in California; Curley, Jon Skibic (guitar) and Nelson laying down and engineering their own parts in Cincinnati, New Jersey and New Orleans respectively. “Once we got the system down, we started flying,” Greg Dulli says.
The album features guest spots from a collection of frequent collaborators including: The late Mark Lanegan, a collaborator of Dulli’s in The Twilight Singers and The Gutter Twins, as well as a close friend. Lanengan sung backup vocals on two album tracks. “It was Mark who named the album,” Dulli says in press notes. Susan Marshall, who contributed to 1998’s 1965 contributes vocals on album track “Catch A Colt.” Van Hunt, who toured with the band in 2012 and contributed to 2014’s Do to the Beast, contributes vocals on “Jyla” and “Take Me There.” And last but definitely not least, Marcy Mays, lead vocalist on Gentlemen‘s “My Curse” contributes vocals to “Domino and Jimmy,” a song that Dulli had specifically written with Mays in mind.
Earlier this year I wrote about “I’ll Make You See God,” which will appear on the new album — and arguably one of the hardest and aggressive songs they’ve written and recorded in close to 30 years. How Do You Burn‘s second single “The Getaway” is an widescreen ballad that pairs Dulli’s whiskey and cigarette-like croon with a gorgeous string arrangement, twinkling keys and Dulli’s unerring knack for crafting earnest, lived-in material with enormous, arena rock friendly hooks.
Directed by Philip Harder and Patrick Pierson, the accompanying video for
“The Getaway” follows a lone astronaut, wandering through brush and desert before encountering an abandoned American rocket launch site. As that happens, we see members of the JOVM mainstays, also in spacesuits walking to a piano and drum set to play together — first while wearing black suits and space helmets and then later without. Of course, considering the state of things, we can’t blame our lone astronaut for wanting to leave the planet.
