We Are The West began way out east in a shipping container on a sheep farm in Holland, then inside a haunted convent in Brooklyn, before growing underground in a parking garage in Los Angeles where founders Brett Hool (voice, guitar) and John Kibler (upright bass, voice) hosted their renowned monthly concert series (“Feels like the wave of the future.” Los Angeles Magazine). After a series of site-specific EPs (garage, barn, desert, farm), their soulful and intricately crafted debut LP The Golden Shore, and providing the soundtrack for upcoming Jacob Elordi film 2 Hearts (June 2nd on Netflix), they've emerged from the pandemic into the warm sunlight with a brisk and immediate collection, their finest work yet.
This record came together very naturally and was delayed very unnaturally. Back when corona was just a beachy brew, we gathered the new songs we'd been working on in our underground parking garage shows and headed downtown to Whispering Pines. Our main bubs Lord Huron kindly let us in, Ben Tolliday (LH, Hozier, Rick Rubin's Broken Record) set up his magical microphonic machines, and we set about recording them live. Deep into overdubland, we hit the road in the new year, touring up the coast until Brett took a step to nowhere and broke the hell out of his leg after a gig. The break hit the brakes on everything for a few weeks right until the whole world hit the brakes with the new corona, and everyone knows the story since. With a fresh titanium tibia in the band and no gigs on the horizon, we started a radio show The Golden Hour on Malibu's homegrown KBUU. During the various lockdowns we magically met Kyle Mullarky (Babe Rainbow, Little Wings, Allah-Las) who invited us to his ranch to mix the songs, then turned us onto John Golden who mastered it. Our first gigs in a year and a half have been all acoustic affairs at the family farm in Malibu and new tunes are already growing alongside the crops.
