16 Horsepower was a mythical band when I lived on Capitol Hill in Denver, CO. Story goes, they lived in Leadville, an old mining town, just on the other side of the ski resort, Copper Mountain. They lived in a house on a few acres, made their own whiskey, brewed their own beer. Hunted game. Deer and fowl. They made the kind of music that wasn’t easily identifable, except to say it was uniquely Rocky Mountain or “Colorado” with the constant being the voice of principal songwriter, guitarist-vocalist and arranger, David Eugene Edwards.
Two decades later, Edwards and his now-established musical incarnation, Wovenhand has released their seventh studio record, Refractory Obdurate, on Deathwish Inc (home of Converge, Deafheaven, Oathbreaker, etc). Former members Chuck French and Neil Keener of the post-hardcore band, Planes Mistaken for Stars, are now part of Wovenhand with Neil on bass and Chuck on guitar.
If someone told me there’d be a band that slightly resembles the conceptual (musical) DNA of McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and hauntingly reflects the ghost town’s of the rocky mountains, I’d call that man a liar and fill him with lead–then I’d hang my head in shame as I dropped the needle on the latest from Wovenhand.
A Coat of Red Paint In Hell 