★★★★★
Artist: Wovenhand Title: Refractory Obdurate Label: Deathwish Inc. Release Date: 4/25/2014 Reviewer: Ian Harvey Tracklisting:
01. Corsicana Clip
02. Masonic Youth
03. The Refractory
04. Good Shepherd
05. Salome
06. King David
07. Field of Hedon
08. Obdurate Obscura
09. Hiss
10. El-bow In almost every generation of music there exists a anomaly in the perceived system. An artist or band that becomes legendary and influential and yet remains simultaneously unknown to many...
- www.indievisionmusic.com
2014-08-26
★★★★★
From 16 Horsepower through the last almost 15 years of Wovenhand, David Eugene Edwards hasn't touched much that didn't thrive on tension and looming darkness. The sound itself has changed, moved forward, stepped sideways, but the intensity has never lessened. Edwards's voice has much to do with the tone of the music, falling somewhere between a black-hatted pastor and a warrior resonating from a cave...
- www.popmatters.com
2014-06-18
★★★★★
Some artists revel in the joy and peace of the glory of the Lord, and then there are folks like David Eugene Edwards. Edwards' music with his group Wovenhand is powerful, fascinating stuff, and his frequent citation of stories from the Bible make it clear the man's beliefs are sincere and solidly founded, but a couple spins of 2014's Refractory Obdurate make it clear he's a bigger fan of Jonathan Edwards' "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" than "What a Friend We Have in Jesus...
- www.allmusic.com
2014-06-19
★★★★★
David Eugene Edwards has never been an easy fit for many record labels. Through the 1990s, with the brooding folk-rock act 16 Horsepower, and with the stoic solo reflections of Wovenhand over the last decade, he's bounced among various American imprints--from the majors in the mid-'90s to weirdo outpost Alternative Tentacles, from the once-edgy and now-erstwhile Jetset to the Christian encampment Sounds Familyre. The movement stems, at least in part, from Edwards' deliberate genre aggregation...
- pitchfork.com
2014-05-01
★★★★★
David Edwards' music has imposed on a lot of my peers strongly. I've respected his work with Wovenhand in the past and found 16 Horsepower to be a bit ahead of their time (which I hope translates as the compliment I meant it to be). There's a lot of backstory to his musical path but for all the filler that backstory makes, one thing's apparent - Refractory Obdurate is an anthology of years of musical experience and a fearless venture that mashes up many genres and sounds. The result...
- www.punknews.org
2014-05-06
★★★★★
For the last decade or so as Wovenhand, and for some time before that in 16 Horsepower, David Eugene Edwards has been performing a sort of dark folk-rock that's remained remarkably consistent in both its sound and its unusually high quality. By this point in his career, though, the question arises: does Edwards have a unique sound, or does all his music sound the same...
- www.popmatters.com
2011-01-20
★★★★★
David Eugene Edwards keeps his late-night Wovenhand train rolling through album number five. The ex-Sixteen Horsepower head dude has evolved this one-man project into a full-fledged creative recording and touring unit, and the team here is firing on all cylinders...
- www.hour.ca
2010-11-09
★★★★★
There's always been a southern gothic flair to 16 Horsepower, but that aural darkness was fuelled by galloping rhythms and manic string plucks. Here, David Eugene Edwards steps away from his band in a startling separation, and delivers a stark and gloomy night of an album sure to erect neck hairs. A little violin scrape, a brittle piano tinkle, and cranky pot percussion surround Edwards' desperate preacher-man vocals in an unsettling yet inviting manner...
- www.hour.ca
2010-11-09
★★★★★
Articles about David Eugene Edwards-- former frontman of 16 Horsepower and ringleader of the revolving door project Wovenhand-- use phrases like "evangelical Christian" and "the fire and brimstone Christianity of America's heartland...
- pitchfork.com
2010-09-11
Loading...
