While listening to “Fool,” the latest song from Dan Luke and The Raid, it would be easy to assume they’re a hot new band out of Brooklyn. In reality, the crew is straight outta Kentucky. Growing up the much younger brother of Brad and Matt Shultz of Cage the Elephant, Dan was only ten when Cage took off for Europe to launch their career.
With Cage the Elephant now firmly established as one of the most dynamic bands in rock, Dan Luke and The Raid are ready to stake their own claim as the next big thing from Bowling Green.
“I wrote ‘Fool’ five years ago on the front steps of the first house I lived in after I moved out of my folks’ house,” Luke says of the new track, crafted with his older brother’s help. “So I was new to the whole freedom thing, or at least I thought so. You can hear the youthfulness in it. I feel like I can, at least. It kind of starts out at a full sprint, dies down into a light jog, and ends up in an imaginary empty bedroom dancehall. It’s definitely one you can sing into a hairbrush. Brad really helped us get the song to a more fun place.”
The track pulsates with a melodic sing-song quality, similar in tenor to early Strokes material. Ringing guitars and a bouncing bass line propel “Fool” forward, chock-full of youthful energy and moxie.
“As I said earlier, I wrote it when I was a teenager, so it was really grandiose,” Luke explains. “I was trying so hard to make sure I would be taken seriously, as you do when you’re just out of high school, so I made it as big and dramatic as possible. There’s a time and place for that kind of song for sure, but it just didn’t work. We changed it, and Brad helped us round it out. I love our relationship in the studio. We vibe really well together, but if we do disagree about something, we’re not afraid to say it, because we’re just like that. Lots of love, lots of playful brotherly slaps. Shout out to the Battle Tapes Instagram slap wars of 2018. Let’s dance!”
The band’s debut album, Out of the Blue (not to be confused with the 1977 ELO album of the same name), is set to arrive on October 11. The process wasn’t entirely smooth, as the band had to deal with some genuine tragedy when their guitarist Dylan T. Graves was killed in an accident. It was enough for the group to consider packing it in—but they decided to press on.
“We felt like Dylan would be pissed if we didn’t keep going. But it’s still hard,” Luke told Billboard. “It will always be hard, I’m sure, but I know we’ll always have the things we made together, and in that way a piece of him will be with us.”
Watch the “Fool” video below and pre-order the record here.
October 4—Albuquerque, NM Sister Bar
October 5—Denver, CO Lost Lake Lounge
