Best of What's Next: Woods

Hometown: Brooklyn
Album: Songs of Shame
Members: G. Lucas Crane (tape effects), Jeremy Earl (vocals, guitar), Kevin Morby (bass), Jarvis Taveniere (drums)
For Fans Of: Guided By Voices, Neil Young, Kurt Vile

It’s an unseasonably warm day for January in New York, and G. Lucas Crane is determined to make the most of it. Sprawled out on the rooftop of the converted warehouse he calls home, Woods’ resident tape-deck manipulator digs into a towering stack of pancakes.

When it comes to crafting woozy, psychedelic-tinged folk songs, Crane and his bandmates have always followed their own roadmap. Why would he take a different approach to choosing a breakfast spot?

“We’re focused on attaining pure freedom,” Crane says. “We’re pulling our sound from a very personal place—that’s sort of the overarching thing about how we play music together. We do everything ourselves and it’s very particular. … It’s all coming out of our own little world.”

Listeners are invited into this remarkable “little world” on Woods’ latest album, Songs of Shame (out now). Peppered with hazy campfire jams and off-kilter, homespun pop, the eclectic affair makes it clear that the outfit, which began as a two-piece in 2005, is pretty far-removed from the everyday world. Then, that was already obvious to anyone familiar with the band’s sinister alter ego, Woods Family Creeps.

“It’s the same band, with the same guys, we just sound slightly differently,” Crane says of the inside joke-turned-full-blown side project. “Creeps is about longer jams and less songs—more room for freedom.”

As for whether audiences will be greeted by Woods or their more menacing incarnation when the group plays a slew of North American tour dates in mid-March with Woodsist labelmates Real Estate, Crane says there’s just no telling: “If we show up at a show and there’s a particular kind of vibe, we’ll be like, ‘Hey, we’re going to do Woods Family Creeps tonight’,” he says. “It’s not always planned. We’re pretty impromptu like that.”