The Louder I Call, The Faster It Runs contains the biggest, broadest, boldest music Wye Oak have ever made, and today, the duo of Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack provide a song that exemplifies the band at their most enlightened.
During the intoxicating “It Was Not Natural,” a weary walk through the woods unearths a discarded antler, a talisman that provokes deep questions about our work lives, social codes, and romantic mores. The music—a sophisticated tessellation of pounded piano and loping bass, scattered drums and chirping synthesizer—is as complex and ponderous as the issues themselves. “It Was Not Natural” is Wye Oak at their most sophisticated, navigating life’s difficulties with the nuance and power they demand.
Jenn Wasner offers the following: “This is a story about finding an object of uncertain origin whilst walking through the woods. Or, if you’d rather: it’s about exploring the space between the things that we are socialized to believe about ourselves, and the actual truth of our nature—learning how to push the limits of the systems we’ve put in place to help ourselves make sense of chaos.”
