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Micah Wolf

By Keith Hannaleck

Artist: Micah Wolf
Title: Micah Wolf
Genre: Folk-Rock
Label: Blockplane Records
Website: www.micahwolf.com
Purchase this CD: CD Baby

Michah Wolf’s music is as tranquil and beautiful as his natural surroundings in Hawaii. After around the third spin of this CD this music and the lyrics finally started to soak into my over worked cranium. Wolf comes across with a gentle approach yet he still gets his point across in a song.

This is very mellow laid-back music punctuated by Wolf’s distinct vocal style and elegant acoustic guitar. Although dubbed as folk rock, I heard much more than that. I could hear Wolf reciting poems to music, and in some instances adding his own version of a rap with a rhythm and rhyme to everything (Counting Cracks) he was conveying within a song.

I like what it says on the back cover of the CD…From the ground up. From the construction of the instruments to building our own studio, this album was produced, engineered, and mixed from the ground up-Music is a way of life. Now that tells the story in a literal sense of where Micah and his friends are coming from. I believe it after looking at his biography. He had parents that traveled around to hippie communes in various locations before he became an adult and finally settled in Hawaii. No doubt, his experiences when he was 8 years old when he received his first guitar, the travel, and the exposure to free spirited individuals along with an adventurous lifestyle, shaped who he is today. You can hear it come through in all the rich colors and textures of his music and vocals.

Yes, Micah Wolf comes from places of the heart and soul that few dare to travel within their music because they are too concerned with the commercial viability and technology of the product. This is not a product for Micah. This is his life on the CD, a living breathing entity that needs care, attention, and love, on a continual basis to grow and mature. That in a nutshell is what this music is all about.

Although there is dobro, piano, violin, and drums in the mix, they are understated, although positioned properly to fit into the context of each composition. The voice and guitar of Micah are featured and stand out on the recording, however, everything else you hear is essential to the balance and overall sound of each complete track. I like the way all of the aspects fall together and how each individual track tells a story with the music used as more than just a backdrop. It serves as more of a propellant, an inspiration for Micah to make the lyrics come out and reach you and pull you right in and keep you. It worked well for me but it took more than one listen, which is always the case with anything worth hearing.

Reviewed - February 1, 2007

Tracks:

01. Burn Me (3:49)
02. Self Esteem (3:14)
03. Storm Is Rollin' In (3:23)
04. Pay No Mind (3:34)
05. Plastics (3:48)
06. Burden (3:15)
07. Return To You (3:48)
08. Counting Cracks (4:00)
09. Tease Me (2:10)
10. Muse (4:06)
11. To Forgive (4:37)
12. Stand Tall (4:23)
13. Believe (2:51)

Musicians:

Micah Wolf: guitars, vocal, piano
Eric DeVine: bass, dobro, guitar
Michael Buono: drums
Mark D’Antonio: percussion
Maria Zoe: backup vocals track 6
Don Lax: violin track 10

About the Author:

Keith Hannaleck, known as “MuzikMan” is a Journalist specializing in independent and major music reviews and the promotion of artists via the various media outlets flourishing online. He has worked closely with artists, management, publicity directors, and webmasters to provide some of the best and far-reaching coverage an artist could have. Focusing primarily on the internet as a medium for his work, Keith has been a pioneer in the industry changing the way a reviewer with his various talents are used by many artists, PR folks, and labels. He has provided strong and valuable work to labels, artists, and publicity people, writing reviews, press releases, and biographies and much more over the years, giving the people he works with the maximum amount of exposure through several top-notch websites that post his content on their sites.

Hannaleck built and maintained his own website in 1998 while networking and building his reputation through thousands of reviews and interviews, creating a special niche for himself. Through many years of dedication and hard work, he has reached a respected level of competence and knowledge that is frequently sought by the music industry today. Known for his speaking from the heart interpretations of music and being able to put it in layman’s terms for music fans, his work is found everywhere in cyberspace and in traditional print media, from press kits to quotes from reviews in magazine advertisements.