Wallows 'Model' Sticks to the Groups Classic Sound [Album Review]
Repost from Tour Life Mag [defunct]
A little over three months since the release of the single “Your Apartment,” indie-rock group Wallows released their third studio album Model on May 24, 2024. The group is composed of three members, with Braeden Lemasters and Dylan Minnette (more widely known for his role in Netflix show 13 Reasons Why) as guitarists/vocalists, and Cole Preston on drums, though he does have a few vocal credits.
It has been two years since the group’s second album, Tell Me That It’s Over, was released, so this release was highly anticipated by fans. Five singles were released in the three months leading up to the album, which definitely hyped up the album for a summer drive with the window down vibe.
Opening with the first single that was released, “Your Apartment,” Minnette leads on vocals to tell a story about a breakup that can’t quite stay apart. A strong start to the album, a full review of the song can be found here.
This is followed by a new track, “Anytime, Always,” which has accumulated the most streams on Spotify other than the pre-released singles. With a clean guitar riff and catchy chorus, despite its repetitiveness, this is the perfect song for any summer outing.
The next three tracks, “Calling After Me,” “Bad Dream,” and “A Warning,” were all singles that were released before the album's official release. “Calling After Me” has accumulated the most streams on Spotify, hitting nearly 20 million in the two months since its release. This is almost double the second-most-streamed song on the album, which is the aforementioned opener “Your Apartment.” This can be explained through the upbeat guitar and bass rhythms as Minnette leads on vocals, describing both the excitement and troubles that come from hiding a newly forming relationship.
“Bad Dream” is the first track in the album that has Lemasters on primary vocals, and it's a slow down from the previous upbeat and danceable tunes. Bringing in some piano melodies with a more mellow and dreamy sound, this track describes the anxiety behind having a lull in a relationship. Lemasters sings, “Here we go again, tell me what's been left unsaid / I'm not in your head, can you help me understand?”
This is followed by “A Warning,” which sticks to a similar mellow sound with a slightly heavier driving drumbeat and synth sound. Lemasters and Minnette lead the vocals together on this track, alternating on the verses and joining together on the chorus. Together, they narrate the doubts and confusion that come with getting broken up with. This is optimized in the refrain, “These are all the things that we'll choose to remember / Did you cross your fingers when you said forever? / Did it look the same with the other before me? / Am I just a name you flip through in your story / Of people / You’ve made to love you?”
Track six, “I Wouldn’t Mind,” brings in Preston on lead vocals, which is the third song in the band's discography in which he does so. Coming in with a dominating drumbeat, the song is once again on a mellower side, with simple guitar riffs and a whistle track playing over the majority of the chorus. Preston’s vocals get a bit lost in the mixing, but it is still an enjoyable and relaxing listen.
The last single to be released, and the farthest one down on the tracklist, “You (Show Me Where My Days Went)” brings back the guitar-driven sound. This echoey, feel-good track takes the listener through the feeling of meeting someone who seems to make everything feel right. Though it's led by Minnette, Lemasters joins in to harmonize on the chorus, tying together the dreamy sound.
“Canada” initially feels like a continuation of the last track, with similar drum rhythms, but this quickly changes into a more energized synthesized sound. The vocals come in after a 40-second instrumental intro, with a tone that seems more tame than all that led up to it. Minnette vocally leads this love song, and though the chorus doesn’t particularly stick out when compared to similar tracks on the album, it continues the feel-good sound that the previous track brings in.
First played as an unreleased track at a show at The Roxy Theater in Los Angeles in September 2023, “Don’t You Think It’s Strange?” brings the album back to the upbeat sound that it began with. This danceable track is led by Lemesters, and its snappy chorus and cheerful beat are hard not to sing and clap along to.
Minnette comes back in on “She’s An Actress,” which doesn’t seem to have any distinct chorus. It has similar themes to “Canada,” being an optimistic love song, yet it differs musically, with a quick yet muted drumbeat and simple guitar riff. Though it may get lost in the second half of the album, it is still a perfect song to throw on a romantic playlist.
Switching back to Lemasters, “Going Under” definitely stands out from the rest of the tracks on this album. The first half of the song sounds like any other Wallows song, but during the bridge, the instrumentals begin to drop out, and the following verse has Lemasters screaming into the microphone. The track encapsulates feelings of anxiety and insecurity over the outcome of a relationship, and the screaming seems to represent the breakdown that comes from being overwhelmed by these emotions. The idea is there, but it falls a bit flat in terms of mixing, with the instrumentals fighting between dreamy and static. Despite this, it is certainly an interesting element to the album, and fans of Lemasters rank this track highly in their album rankings.
The album closes out on track twelve, “Only Ecstacy,” which was also the first unreleased track played at the band’s surprise 2023 Lollapalooza Aftershow at the Metro in Chicago. The longest track on the album, though most of it is from harmonies, Minnette closes out with another dreamy and mellow love song. The vocals are more prominent than in “Canada'' and “She’s An Actress,” but the instrumental still peaks through in vocal breaks, with the reintroduction of the synthesizer.
Overall, this album isn’t anything out of the ordinary for Wallows. It has seen some criticism for its lack of experimentation, but the group continues to see success in sticking by their original sound, and it certainly works for them. The band has already sold out five of their stadium-size shows, and numerous others have low ticket warnings. Between the already loyal fans and those pulled in by the new album release, Wallows will definitely be riding a high for the duration of this era.
You can catch Wallows on their ‘Model’ world tour, which kicks off on August 6 in Portland, OR. Tickets can be found on the band’s website, and other updates on the group can be found on their Instagram, @wallowsmusic, and their informational Instagram, @wallowsinfo.