Looking the part means nothing if you don’t have the tunes; fortunately, while Derby’s These Wicked Rivers absolutely rock the preacher hats and grizzled beards thing, it’s their songwriting chops that’s turned them into real contenders.
Force Of Nature, the follow-up to debut Eden (2020), is an ambitious, achingly classic rock-inflected showcase of great songs, all of them well-crafted and designed for maximum live effect.
For potent, riff-led tunes look no further than the blazing title track, The Family, Black Gold and Testify, but the band’s real strength lies in the mellow and soulful, with vocalist John Hartwell as world-weary, heart-on-sleeve troubadour.
When The War Is Won, Just To Be A Man and Don’t Pray For Me build expertly from quiet beginnings to intensely dynamic climaxes, while emotional closer Lonely Road finds Hartwell in solo acoustic soul-searching mode. Force Of Nature couldn’t be more aptly titled.
Physical copies of Force Of Nature are available from Eyesore Merch.
