Hometown: Deerfield, Ill.
Members: Logan Baren (vocals, guitar), Justin Baren (bass, vocals), Andrew Langer (guitar) and Ben Greeno (drums).
Fun fact: While the Baren brothers are only in their early 20s, they’ve been playing together for years, first as a popular Beatles/Stones cover combo called The Pages. Playing nothing but dusty classics on the weekends? “Hey, that’s how we learned the traps, learned how to write good songs,” says younger brother Justin.
Why they’re worth watching: The Redwalls’ Capitol-issued sophomore set, De Nova, is an Anglophile’s dream, full of jangly Fab Four-isms and sharp takes on Americana.
For fans of: The Beatles, early-’70s Bowie, The Kinks and the Stones.
Meet the mop-topped, gaze-averting Baren siblings and you’re immediately hit with a spooky sense of Oasis deja vu. They might not dust it up like the fisticuff-prone Gallaghers—“We’ve always been more like partners in crime,” assesses Justin—but there’s a Liam-spunky swagger in their attitude that’s part of the band’s intrinsic charm.
So it’s not surprising, then, that The Redwalls’ opening-act presence was recently requested by Noel Gallagher himself, for a hot-ticket club gig in London a couple months ago. Was the meeting a brotherly battle? Not at all, chortles Justin.
“You hear all this stuff about ’em, but they were very cool—they came out and watched our set, and we had a drink with ’em afterwards. … They’d recorded their last album in the Capitol building in L.A., and I guess somebody gave ’em our record while they were there. They put two and two together, and invited us over to do the show. So the Gallaghers obviously liked our music.”
The Barens were made for Britain. “They’re definitely into old rock ’n’ roll over there, just like we are. We went to some art-college party in London, and they were listening to nothing but old soul music. It was definitely a good scene—it was how it should be.”