“Yes. Yes, I did miss the email about black sweatshirts.” Kyle Engedal, Jason “Spindle” West, Peter Diedrick, and Brent Kuechenmeister are The Perennials. They have a van.

In my experience, an indicator of a good band is if they’re hard to describe. In many cases it’s because they bring together so many influences that on their own are all fine and great, but together create something wholly new and interesting. Such is the case with The Perennials, an Eau Claire band whose members bring with them years of experience in other bands and a vast and diverse knowledge of their medium.

You can hear Kyle channeling the hard and deep hits of John Bonham, while Brent shreds the classic rock riffs and solos. Peter brings clear but distinct pop and classical influences, while Spindle infuses punk. As Brent puts it, “Somehow it works.”

As near as I can tell, the easiest way to describe them is “early garage rock.” Listening to them makes me think of bands in the 60s, before there even was such a thing as “garage rock.” These were musicians who just gathered up friends in their garage or basement – not with a niche or sound in mind – simply to rock.

It’s convenient that The Perennials’ origin isn’t far off. It was an idea tossed around between guitarist Peter Diedrick, bassist JH West (better known as “Spindle”), and drummer Kyle Engedal. The idea materialized for a New Year’s show at The House of Rock with another new band at the time, The Ever-Expanding Hippo Brigade (now sadly defunct). In the months that followed, they added guitarist Brent Kuechenmeister (“Brent K”) and substituted Eric Lee on drums for Kyle, while he stayed at home with a new baby.

Now Kyle is back, and The Perennials are recording roughly nine original tracks with Jaime Hansen. This just over a year after they started. Which is convenient given their namesake, which Peter says “implies continuity and beauty,” referencing the use of the term with flowers that “return every year” and “are always here.”

That’s a comforting thought, given The Perennials’ music. My favorite song (and the one that they often close sets with) is One-Night Standard, with each of its distinct parts having its own effective hook and an overall melody that I mentally hum for days. Shake the Walls is another catchy tune, but more in the way a punk song’s parallelism and repetition can be hypnotizing and make you roughly sing along without actually knowing the words.

The consistent thread in each of their tracks is what their members bring to the table. You can hear Kyle channeling the hard and deep hits of John Bonham, while Brent shreds the classic rock riffs and solos. Peter brings clear but distinct pop and classical influences, while Spindle infuses punk. As Brent puts it, “Somehow it works.”

While they felt confident about the songs they were about to record when I talked with them at Island of Dr. Lee studio, how the public will consume said tracks is less clear. But it ultimately doesn’t really matter whether they decide to release on vinyl (7” with digital download), digital only, or CD – either way, you’re gonna want to get it.