Winged Wheel is a band that includes Whitney Johnson (Matchess, Circuit des Yeux), Cory Plump (Spray Paint), Matthew J. Rolin (Powers/Rolin Duo), Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth), Lonnie Slack, and Fred Thomas (Idle Ray, Tyvek). You could practically them a supergroup. The patient, exploratory “Desert So Green” is their third album, following 2024’s “Big Hotel”. Working out of a studio on the outskirts of Chicago, the band embraced a more cohesive approach, foregoing some of the jammy tendencies of their previous records for deeper experimentation.
“So, how did this band even happen?” That’s the question most often asked of “Winged Wheel”, a creatively and geographically scattered collective who have somehow congregated to make a noise that’s unexpected but undeniable. With each player living in a different city and bringing their own unique element to the group’s chain reactions. Early long distance file-trading between a few members yielded 2022’s “No Island”, a debut album that was accidentally really good.
Good enough for the band to expand their membership and meet in person for the sessions that became 2024’s “Big Hotel”, a surgically-assembled murk of high energy kosmische rock with jammed-out tendencies. Fast forward just a little and all of a sudden the band that started out as a passing idea has completed multiple tours, become a taper’s dream with sets that drift through structure and improvisation, and ridden the momentum to places unforeseen on their third album, “Desert So Green”.
released January 9th, 2026
Winged Wheel :
Whitney Johnson
Cory Plump
Matthew J Rolin
Steve Shelley
Lonnie “Palmtree” Slack
Fred Thomas
The Fat Angel Sings 