Last year Will Kraus, who records full-bodied, blistering shoegaze songs under his last name, talked to Pitchfork about his ambiguous lyrics. “It’s about half just kind of saying stuff into the microphone and half words,” he said. “I don’t feel like good enough of a writer right now to really have too many lyrics be front and center.” Though he hasn’t improved much on that front with his second album, March’s Path (Terrible), his glum, echoing vocals and crestfallen lyrics come through much more clearly on that record than on his charming 2016 debut, End Tomorrow. But Kraus’s approach is not without its strengths; when his crushing guitars, ecstatic drums, and samples deploy melodies that cut through the atmosphere like a foghorn on “Big Blood,” his vocal caterwauling just adds more strength to the muscular track. Kraus continues to do well at keeping his ideas—and words—as intangible as possible; I can’t make out a damn thing he says on the weightless, near-ambient closer, “Mostly,” and I’m not mad about it. v
Young shoegaze maven Will Kraus expresses himself even more clearly on his second album, Path
