* En anglais uniquement
With their guitar-free lineup and songs ranging from anti-consumerist manifestos to homages to sci-fi heroes,
Wax Chattels put their own bracing spin on post-punk traditions. The live-wire Auckland, New Zealand trio captured the intensity of their live shows -- and upheld the darker, more aggressive side of their homeland's musical legacy -- on 2018's
Wax Chattels. With 2020's
Clot, they added more precision to their incisive, explosive music.
Wax Chattels' bassist/vocalist
Amanda Cheng and keyboardist/vocalist
Peter Ruddell met while they were studying jazz performance at the University of Auckland. After they reunited at a 2016
Preoccupations show, they decided to form a band of their own.
Ruddell, a multi-instrumentalist who focused on saxophone during his time at the university's School of Music, was inspired by old horror movies and the no-holds-barred performance style of Tokyo's music scene, where he spent some time after leaving school. Combined with
Cheng's passion for examining adversity -- particularly the challenges encountered by young women of color -- the duo had a rich artistic background.
At first,
Cheng and
Ruddell wrote songs with a drum machine, but to make their live shows more intense, they enlisted former classmate
Tom Leggett as the band's drummer. Inspired by the likes of
Mark Guiliana,
Paul Motian, and
Deantoni Parks,
Leggett pared his drum kit down to the bare essentials. The trio spent a year working on songs before releasing their debut single, "Gillian," a tribute to The X-Files'
Gillian Anderson, in August 2017. Soon after,
Wax Chattels played a furious set at The Others Way festival that led to deals with New Zealand's legendary label Flying Nun Records as well as Captured Tracks, which issued the single "Stay Disappointed" that December. Largely recorded in a few days, the band's self-titled debut album appeared on both labels in May 2018. During the six months
Wax Chattels spent touring the world in support of the album, it reached number seven on the Official New Zealand Album Charts, was shortlisted for the Taite Music Prize, and was nominated for Best Independent Debut at the 2018 New Zealand Music Awards.
Wax Chattels' members then took some time to work on other projects:
Leggett played with the feminist post-punk band
Miss June, who released their debut album,
Bad Luck Party, in September 2019. Meanwhile,
Ruddell launched his solo project Sulfate, whose self-titled debut also appeared that month. In addition,
Cheng,
Leggett, and
Ruddell spent much of 2019 writing
Wax Chattels' second album,
Clot. Appearing in September 2020, it featured contributions from engineer
Ben Greenberg (also of
the Men and
Uniform) and producer
James Goldsmith, both of whom helped the band streamline their attack. ~ Heather Phares