Here at the Send Me Your Ears studio today, we’ve been listening to the latest single from Paris (France) band, Folsom. North Carolina was released on June 8, 2023.
Our regular readers will recall just how much we loved Folsom’s previous release, Old Pop’s Truck, so we were super-excited to see them reach the top of our reviews pile today.
Folsom are Peter Cattet: Vocals & Guitar, Florian Garcin: Lead guitar, Theo Defranoux: Bass, Leo Flank: Drums, and together they are creating some stunning Southern Rock/ Classic Rock/ Blues grooves that will excite and delight fans of Red Hot Chilli Peppers, and anyone who loves a deep and growly, gritty male vocal.
North Carolina fades in with an ear-catching drum fill before heading into a positively intoxicating rhythmic and clicky bass line. If you’re not moving your hips yet, you don’t have the volume turned up enough.
Guitar riffs intermingle with the intoxicating bass rhythms before Cattet’s gruff vocals join the mix. As the song leads into the chorus, the layered stereo backing vocals grab your attention with a catchy sing-along section that we can imagine filling a stadium.
We absolutely loved the Rage Against The Machine style heavy rock riff. Guitar and bass playing the same single note – the song is almost like RATM on a significantly less aggressive day!
Folsom make superb use of sections within their songs – we remember this from their previous single. North Carolina easily keeps the listeners’ attention with tons of rise and fall and sectioning to give your ears something new all the time.
We love the running 16s on the bass – this works really well, and is clear but without dominating. There are some extremely proficient and classy drum fills thrown in for good measure too.
The repeated RATM-style guitar and bass riff takes you to a stinger ending which leaves you wondering what Folsom are going to come up with next!
Ideas from our ears
This is a clean and punchy mix for sure. There are a few places, particularly when the vocal is in the lower register, where the vocal is getting a little lost. Some extra compression and maybe a little volume automation might help make the quieter parts a bit more audible. As always, these are just some ideas from our ears.
Final thoughts
Folsom are creating consistently impressive music that takes influences from many sub-genres of rock music. Thoroughly impressive and engaging music from four highly skilled and dedicated musicians. More please!
https://spinnup.link/309268-bad-ways-mark-ii
https://www.facebook.com/pg/TheFolsomBoys/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/6vlk9t1vvByfSGL0RovKCK/about
https://folsomcrew.bandcamp.com/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkqZzni-4ooI1C8LoC9wFUA
https://www.instagram.com/thefolsomboys/