While rock n’ roll is always changing and evolving, sometimes it’s just as refreshing to hear a band throwback to the sounds that built the foundation of the genre. Oakland’s The Helltones do this with a flair and panache that makes the songs on their latest album, Medusa, exquisitely timeless. Stirring up a pot of garage rock, doo-wop, lounge, R&B and soul, the group mines gold from the past while never losing track of modern hooks.
The journey of forming The Helltones has been a long one for guitarist/vocalist Darwin Siegaldoud. Raised in Santa Barbara, CA, he spent a year in Israel on a Kibbutz, where two Canadian neighbors taught him how to record music and how to make guitar playing a way of self-expression. After moving to Oakland and the collapse of his first band, he formed The Helltones with drummer Paul Bowman. Since forming, the group has released two albums and an EP, and are really starting to find their sound on their latest single “Every Time You Pick a Fight” from their upcoming LP Medusa.
With their third album Homesick For Another World coming out later this month, the band recently released the single “Turkey Vulture”, a somber folk ballad that builds into a classic-sounding rock number, sprinkled with mandolin and piano and breezy vocals. Inspired by watching actual turkey vultures swarming a walnut tree while leering down at recent roadkill, lead singer Casey Dayan says…