Split decision: Wolves & Thieves and Bastards of Young

When you see a pair of bands that have each thrown out some songs for their side of a split LP, it's easy to assume quickly that the groups must have been lifelong BFF's who sat around drinking beer and saying, "Dude, we've gotta do a record together!"

The guys from Wolves & Thieves and Bastards of Young had merely shaken hands and done one show together when their split began to take shape - and it's highly doubtful that either of them use terms like "BFF."

"It was kind of random. We got put on a show down in San Francisco at a little dive bar called the Retox Lounge. It was our first time playing down there," said Sean Hills of Sacramento's Bastards of Young.
Both bands "kind of popped up around the same time. We were both networking and trying to get on each other's shows; we just became friends from there," said Jeremy Lux of Bay Area rockers Wolves & Thieves.

Also at that show in San Francisco, which featured Grace Alley and the Atom Age, was a representative from fledgling Swagger City Records, who talked Wolves & Thieves into kicking out seven tracks and also got six from Bastards of Young for the split.

"Outside of that initial show, I'd never really met anyone with that band, but I was really into what Wolves & Thieves was doing," Hills said. "I'm a big fan of that just rock 'n' roll punk rock, kind of mixed in with that East Bay flavor. It's a really cool signature sound.

"After that split came out, obviously we started playing together a lot more and became much closer friends."

Since the release of the split, the bands have played numerous shows together in their respective regions and have also toured together. After playing a show together at the Blackwater Cafe last December, both Wolves & Thieves and Bastards of Young are back to perform at the Plea for Peace Center on Saturday night, joined by For the Win and Hear the Sirens.

Copies of the split LP will be available at the show, and for those who don't rock the vinyl, it comes with a download card to snag the tracks online. As Lux and Hills will both tell you, the two bands are hardly peas in a punk rock pod, but it's the subtle differences between the bands that make the record so appealing (ditto for a dual live show).

"It was different in the sense that we didn't know what (Bastards of Young) were doing for the split. We just said, 'Here's our seven songs,' " Lux said. "It just happens that we're a faster, singier brand of punk rock, and they're more street driven like Bouncing Souls or Against Me.

"I think if you'll like one side, you'll like the other."

"Stylistically, I don't know that our bands have a whole lot in common, other than the fact that we both play punk rock, but I think that's the strength of that record," Hills said. "It doesn't sound the same on both sides, and it's a great way to introduce each other's music to a base that probably wouldn't check it out right away."

Both groups have been in existence about two years, and each was forged from members of several other projects.

Lux, who formed Wolves & Thieves as "an outlet, almost in a therapy sense, of getting stuff off my mind," and his bandmates will be releasing their full-length debut on Swagger City next month, followed by a Western U.S. tour.

"I think we're all on the same page, and we know what we're going for," he said. The album "has elements in the stuff we all grew up with, like punk and hardcore, and even the stuff our parents listened to, from CCR to Black Flag."

Sean Hills and his brother Patrick Hills of Bastards of Young are former members of Hanover Saints, and the band is readying an additional 7-inch split with Anchor Down of Portland, Ore., and In the Red of L.A., with eyes on a full-length album by the end of the year.

"We're all super ramped on how well people have received our music; a lot of our success has come a lot easier than it ever has in the past," Sean Hills said. "I feel like this is the one band that we've had our strongest songwriting, out of all the bands that we've been in before."

Contact Aaron Davis at features@recordnet.com.