Asheville FM Presents: Wye Oak w/ Ohmme at The Mothlight

Asheville FM Presents…
Wye Oak
w/ OHMME
at The Mothlight
Thursday, February 27th
Doors 8pm, Show 9pm
Tickets: $15adv/ $18dos

For over a decade, Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack have collaborated under the moniker Wye Oak, a band known for “forging an audacious creative path” (NPR Music). Their partnership, long imbued with a sense of ambition and restlessness, has transcended genre, growing and shifting over the course of five critically acclaimed full-length records, including last year’s The Louder I Call, The Faster it Runs which The New York Times called “the sound of a band simultaneously delving deeper into its music and opening it up”. Those paying close attention to the duo will also have noticed a list of additional aliases, collaborations, and experimentations that have fallen outside of the parameters of the project for which they are best known.

The past few years have been an especially fruitful period for the duo outside of Wye Oak- including releases from their solo projects, Wasner’s, Flock of Dimes and Stack’s, Joyero, touring as members of Bon Iver, Sylvan Esso and Lambchop, as well as collaborating as producers, composers and multi-instrumentalists with everyone from the Brooklyn Youth Chorus and Metropolis Ensemble, to Deerhoof, Helado Negro and Madeline Kenney. Wasner and Stack have been intrinsically woven into the fabric of the progressive musical landscape of the past decade.

Along the way, the duo have prioritized setting aside time to rediscover why their collaboration has been an integral part of their creative expression for close to fifteen years. With Wasner and Stack living in the same city, their adopted home of Durham, NC, for the first time since 2012, they have begun to chart a new path. Suddenly free to re-examine and rework the pre-existing confines of their partnership, the duo returned to the studio in the summer of 2019. The result is the most generous and daring material of their career. The first look into this new music is the searing single, “Fortune,” a bombastic excavation of change and loss, mourning and resilience. “Fortune” is a high water-mark in an already celebrated catalog—indicative of the kinetic propulsion with which Wasner and Stack push their art forward.

In addition to releasing new music, the band is mounting their most ambitious tour yet. The tour, JOIN, will feature Wasner, Stack and a newly expanded live band performing music from all of their various projects- Wye Oak Flock of Dimes, Joyero and beyond. These performances will be rare, featuring new material, re-imaginings of songs from deep in their catalog, and hidden gems spanning their parallel creative work with the primary intention to present what feels most significant in the moment. At almost fifteen years in, Wye Oak continue to search, to ask questions, to experiment and to take the risks that make them one of the most vital creative collectives of their generation.