Miles Wide - Lone on the Mountain/moon howls

Miles Wide

Lone on the Mountain/Moon Howls
self-released; 2014

3.3 out of 5/3.5 out of 5

By Ted Rogen

I was listening to Lone on the Mountain by MIles Wide and the first thing I was thinking was that I wished some of the songs had more instrumentation. Lone on the Mountain is an unplugged, acoustic demo featuring recordings from live performances around Rochester, NY from MIles Wide. The next sentence on his bandcamp page states that his previous record Moon Howls has all these songs with fuller instrumentation. Perfect.

Let’s first talk about Lone on the Mountain. Truth be told there isn’ t much to talk about here. Wilde has an attractive voice and the songs sound more melancholy stripped down. I have to say as far as contemporary artists go it’s going to be hard to hold my attention with an acoustic guitar and vocals unless your name is Kristian Matsson or Samuel Beam. There really isn’t much of an exception here. Wilde isn’t a bad guitarist by any stretch of the imagination but he also isn’t pulling guitar gymnastics that have any kind of wow factor.

Suffice it say Moon Howls is dynamically rich and multi-colored album compared to Lone on the Mountain. The title track “Moon Howls” contains complex bass work  and drums which give the song a surge of energy. WIlde sings “Wind blows; children cry The moon howls and so do I Faces smile and the grass grows The whole world turns and no one knows”.

One of the strongest tracks was “Sit Think and Stare”. Wlde delivers one his best vocal performances here and at his best has some some similarities to Paul Simon. He lyrics are introspective, deep and also sung with conviction. The stand out track was “On The Street Tonight”. It’s a soulful song with slick singing on Moon Howls and sounds pretty good on Lone on the Mountain as well.

Both these albums are far from perfect but Wilde has some talent in the songwriting department and does have a good sounding  voice but somewhat standard singing style. He has skill but I have a feeling his full potential hasn’t truly been tapped with these releases.

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