ChameleouS Spent Three Decades Getting to Wicked Din

What it covers

Apricot Magazine's angle is time: an album built from songs Mac wrote between the late 1990s and 2006, held back until the right six players were in a room. The piece walks the tracklist in order and lands on the record as a case for patience — what happens when songs get years to become themselves before anyone presses record.

From the review

There is a particular kind of debut album that only becomes possible after musicians have already lived entire lifetimes in music before ever releasing anything under a shared band name, and Wicked Din carries exactly that accumulated weight.

Apricot Magazine

ChameleouS has built Wicked Din into a debut that succeeds specifically through its patient, considered construction.

Apricot Magazine

This album demonstrates what becomes possible when musicians allow songs genuine time to develop before finally committing them to tape.

Apricot Magazine

That particular phrase, wicked din, suggests something between chaotic noise and genuine mischief, fitting naturally alongside a band whose entire name reflects constant shifting and transformation rather than settling into any single fixed identity.

Apricot Magazine

Unshakable No closes the record … giving Wicked Din a genuinely fitting conclusion that honors the roots influences woven throughout the collection without ever fully committing to any single genre convention.

Apricot Magazine

… keeping Brian Wooten's pedal steel and lap steel work specifically because those instruments honor the band's Tennessee roots even while the broader album moves through considerable additional territory spanning blues, swing, jazz, and synth-driven rock textures.

Apricot Magazine

Songs they singled out

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