Lupo Città aren’t a jam band by any stretch of the imagination. However, they are the embodiment of what it is to be in a band. People in a room, exchanging ideas and letting the creative process take its natural course.
The story of Lupo Città is one where the stars align. Spirits forming as one, it was something that was meant to be. Sarah Black (guitar / bass), Chris Brokaw (vocals / guitar) and Jenn Gori (vocals / drums), all living in New York and Seattle at exactly the same time without crossing paths, before ending up back in Boston where, finally, Lupo Città was born.
With Black and Gori now residing in Minneapolis, having been in bands together over the years (Bleeding Hickeys, The Lie-Ons, Pointing Geenas and Brandy Thunders), alongside Brokaw, who continues his excellent run of form on the back of last year’s Ghost Ship, with the return of Pullman and, most recently, his collaboration alongside Tanya Donelly, Lupo Città return with Inverno.
What began on the other side of lockdown, Lupo Città celebrates the human connection we all have felt post-lockdown. Even in these dire times, the three-piece shake off the rust through creating. Their 2024 self-titled debut found a place in your mind where if indie-rock was a thing in the ’70s, then Lupo Città would have dominated the AM airwaves. Inverno lands a little differently, but in all the right ways.
It’s evident from the first note of Wandering Eye. All dub and wah-wah pedal bouncing off the garage walls, Brokaw’s melody takes flight. Lupo Città, gliding into the ether, and taking their audience with them.
Lupo Città - InvernoNext is Something Else. The kind of song born from half an idea knocking around that suddenly drops out of the speakers fully-formed. They say timing is everything, and with a line like, “I’m half blind / So set a course that I can find”, it’s these sharp vignettes that encompass Inverno.
And while the unvarnished Can’t See and the bruising Nap at Dawn see the band carrying the spirit of punk to the Earth’s end, there are plenty of places Lupo Città travel to in between. (Led by the meandering blues of Satisfy, which stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Eleventh Dream Day.)
The storytelling on Inverno is just as beguiling. The rollicking To the Last Look, a harrowing tale of a protagonist splitting town (“West / Never the best”). Meanwhile, the warm resonance on the beautiful Red + Yellow could have been on Ghost Ship. The next song, Profile, actually is. Brokaw, now flanked by Black and Gori who together give the song some Ragged Glory treatment.
Most bands would be hard-pressed to write a better song than Red + Yellow, but Lupo Città manage it with Inverno’s eponymous song. Written in waking sleep in the early hours, Gori excavates to new depths. The line, “Pull down the sun to be alone / Far away but close to whole sky is my love alone / The street, the sun so cold / Jump off”, something the is simply timeless.
On Southern Forests, a meandering Breeders-tinged jam that concludes with something akin to Come colliding My Bloody Valentine, the most telling snapshot comes from Gori and Brokaw (“I’m not anyone, anymore”). Here Lupo Città submit to the power of creation. The power of music and community, which is essentially what Inverno is all about.
Inverno is out now via 12XU. Purchase from Bandcamp.
