Wunderhorse: 2025

This  FUV Live session is also available as a podcast, "FUV Live Sessions." We're elevating WFUV's long history of live sessions and interviews via a podcast that you can find on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Amazon Podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday.

After Jacob Slater's former band, the tumultuous punk trio Dead Pretties, faded away in 2017, he returned to Cornwall to figure out his next step and deal with some personal issues. He found the internal peace he sought coaching surfing and working as a landscape gardener. Notably, Slater reconnected with a different facet of his songwriting.

In the midst of the pandemic, he was cast as Sex Pistols drummer Paul Cook in the Danny Boyle-directed mini-series "Pistol" and around the same time, Slater also formed a new project, Wunderhorse, which initially developed more as a solo endeavor.

Wunderhorse's 2022 debut album, Cub, got Slater and his band tagged as "indie's best secret" by the UK music press. Their own gigs, plus tours with Pixies and Fontaines D.C., have built their following, but Slater says he didn't feel that Cub represented Wunderhorse's full potential.

For 2024's Midas, the group's second album, Slater's band — guitarist Harry Fowler, drummer Jamie Staples, and bassist Pete Woodin — came together cohesively as a single entity. Their producer, Craig Silvey, decided to take Wunderhorse to Minnesota's Pachyderm Recording Studios to record, where Steve Albini famously produced albums for P.J. Harvey (Rid of Me), Nirvana (In Utero) and Pixies (Surfer Rosa).

That Albini DIY aesthetic is important to Wunderhorse — this FUV Live session took place a few months after Albini's death in May of last year and his passing resonated for the band.  Although Slater was battling a bad cold when Wunderhorse came to Studio A, the band blasted through two tracks from Midas — the title track and "Rain" — and one song from Cub, "Teal." 

Slater spoke about how his disappointing Dead Pretties era informed him when Wunderhorse took flight, and how this new band has come into focus from its early days, shifting to a grungier, more muscular sound. Also, the band spoke about how their respect for Albini bled into some of the production elements, from mic placement to allowing imperfection to stand in their live takes.

[Recorded: 9/11/24; Engineered by Jim O'Hara with Erin Merriman and Gwen Taylor; produced by Meghan Offtermatt. Videographers: Anna Fahy; Louisa Schramm; Olivia Iannaccone; Alena Godas and Mia Vilke.]