As elder statesmen in Portland’s music scene, long-running post-punk trio Woolen Men have seen the boom-and-bust genre cycle more times than they care to remember. But one era, in particular, stands out in drummer and songwriter Raf Spielman’s mind as pivotal to the band’s creative journey.
“It’s interesting being in Pacific Northwest. We were around when Naomi Punk showed up and all of a sudden everyone was doing the grunge thing again. We didn’t go that route, and it passed very fast,” he says. “That was when we were like, ‘We don’t have to do any of this stuff. It doesn’t matter. We can do whatever we want.’”
Making the music they want without consideration of what might sell or what’s popular at the moment is central to Woolen Men’s DNA. In the decade that Spielman, guitarist Alex Geddes, and bassist Lawton Browning have played together as Woolen Men—2018 marks exactly 10 years for the trio—they’ve doggedly remained committed to the DIY punk ethos that pre-dates the transmogrification of “indie music” from a lifestyle to a sound, while quietly amassing a discography of sterling releases on a jumble of formats that show a band crafting an oeuvre of what might once have been called “college rock”: intelligent, tuneful guitar rock with a streak of punk rock grit underneath the hooks. They also released the decade’s best political post-punk record years before the term “angular guitars” started showing up regularly in the music press again: 2015’s instantly classic Temporary Monument (this isn’t hyperbole—go listen to it). -Bandcamp
Full Interview Here.