The Candeliers: Kitchen sink pop

The biggest knock against Milwaukee bands over the years is that there’s never been a “sound” that defines the city. That’s not really true for Riverwest, though, where a number of bands recently have established a kitchen-sink aesthetic, embracing eclectic instrumentation, eccentric (but undeniably pop) songcraft, and a sort of shaggy communalism directly influenced by the neighborhood’s counterculture roots. The new self-titled album from indie-pop band The Candeliers—which will be celebrated with a show tonight at Linneman’s—epitomizes the Riverwest sound, with squawking horns, swooping strings, and all sorts of miscellaneous hullabaloo crowding up around indelibly catchy songs like the fractured country number “Bittersweet Sounds.”

At least that’s what we think. But singer Emily Morrow, whose harmonizing with frontman Riles Walsh forms the core of The Candeliers’ sound, shrugs off the “kitchen-sink” characterization, at least as it pertains to her band these days. “When we first started, I heard that a lot more. But we’ve definitely moved away from that,” Morrow tells Decider. “I like that kind of music, but I don’t think that’s what we’re going for. It’s pop music, you know?”

Whatever you want to call it, The Candeliers has been a long time coming. While the band is among the city’s most popular indie-rock outfits, it hasn’t put out a full-length record until now. “We started recording in the basement last summer, and it wasn’t really turning out the way we wanted it to,” Morrow says. “The music wasn’t developed as far as we wanted it to be. It just took a while to get it the way we wanted it to sound. It’s like being in a relationship. The longer you’re around somebody, the more the relationship develops. We got to know each other better musically.” The band eventually ended up going into the studio last fall with Milwaukee producer-engineer Justin Perkins.

Along with The Candeliers, Morrow and Walsh are also members Farms In Trouble and Trash Crack. (All three bands put out records on Walsh’s excellent Activities Recordings label.) But Morrow says she considers The Candeliers to be her “main thing,” at least for now. “I think when you’re working on something, that’s your main focus. When we were putting out the Farms and Trash Crack release, that was the main focus at that point,” she says.