Blurring the edges of genre and pushing the boundaries of modern metal, thrash, hardcore, punk and rock and roll, the five-piece hard rock band Waxed has spent years melting faces in the American South and ripping its native Nashville’s scene to shreds with a heavy pour of immaculate riffage, raucous live energy and in-your-face attitude. Formed in the mid-2010’s by guitarist Davis Haley and frontman Luc Richards when they were teenagers, Waxed’s lineup ebbed and flowed before being cemented as a quintet, with Will Alley joining on bass, Ian Sundstrom on drums and Luc’s older brother Noel Richards on guitar. Earning a reputation as one of the region’s most exciting live acts, the band has recently opened gigs for Jack White and Converge as well as a tour with Missing Piece Records labelmates Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs. Making good on the promise laid out by the 2022 debut album Give Up, Waxed is set to release The Continental Way, a set of songs that represents not only what this band is and the thoughtful havoc it is capable of wreaking, but also the kaleidoscopic, melting pot current state of today’s rock and roll culture.  

Having met while singing Ramones songs in the fifth grade bathroom, young Davis and Luc bonded over skateboarding and playing music. Forming their first band in sixth grade, the pair began by playing basements and school talent shows, often the youngest kids in the room. In their mid-teens, they formed the earliest incarnation of what would become Waxed as a skate-punk trio with their drummer friend Zach Butler (now in New York’s The Mystery Lights), with Davis on guitar and Luc assuming the role of frontman and singer out of necessity. (A capable guitarist, Luc writes songs for Waxed but sticks to the mic during shows.) Taking influence from West Coast punk bands like Agent Orange, Black Flag and Dead Kennedys, the group’s legend began after an impressive slot at famed Nashville venue The Other Basement, known for hosting scene stalwarts like JEFF the Brotherhood, Diarrhea Planet, Turbo Fruits, Noel and Ian’s own band Syrian Nukes Over Disneyland and more.  

“We were kids, but I remember it being awesome and everyone building us up,” Davis says. “From then on, we were convinced: this is what we want to do. This has been our identity since adolescence. Starting Waxed is when I began to feel like myself.”  

“It’s almost like the band has never not existed; it’s been a thing for half our lives,” Luc adds.  

Years passed, band members came and went, but once Ian and Will formed the new rhythm section and sometime after Noel joined as a second guitarist, the band realized something had clicked in a new way. After a decade of gigging around the area to earn their stripes, they began writing the songs that would become Give Up. Releasing a debut album and touring on it helped the band mature exponentially, but all members agree that it didn’t quite encapsulate all they had to offer. And so work began on a new album, one that would show the world more of what they were about.  

Most Waxed songs begin with a riff, contributed by anyone but most often by Davis. Sometimes supplying a guitar part with a short phrase or working title, Davis will share the tune with Luc, who in turn begins to write lyrics — typically by feeling out a vision or vibe rather than melody, and many times with Davis’s words as inspiration. From there, the rest of the band write their parts around this seed, incorporating their multitude of influences — from sludge and heavy metal to Van Halen and ZZ Top to Tom Petty and thrash to Sublime and Jane’s Addiction and even Alison Krauss — into a stew that can only be called Waxed.  

The Continental Way (named for a joke about day drinking in a Peep Show spinoff sketch) features nine tracks packed to the gills with every move on every page in the Waxed playbook. It is a dense, smoldering collection that — like all great hard rock — assaults our ears in the best way, challenging what we think about conventional genres and blurring the lines between them. The record opens with the standout, five-minute-plus “Mother’s Day,” a driving, forceful song that surrounds its chugging riffs and mysterious tale of “lace and chains” with pristine, jazz-metal vignettes. As Luc explains, the lyrics exemplify his less-is-more process: “It’s inspired by a poem Noel wrote about accidentally finding something horrifying in our 

parents’ closet when he was young. It’s a kick-ass idea for a song, but you have to leave some mystery and innuendo. I want you to be unsettled, but I don’t want to show you the monster.”  

“She’s Had Enough” begins with a deliberate, menacing bass strum before being joined by sinister guitars and crashing drums. The oldest song on the album, it finds the band putting their own stamp on a Type O Negative vibe to find dynamics in simplicity, moving deftly from restraint to explosiveness. The dark and heavy “Slow Lane” cruises steady while the guitars squeal and shriek over Luc’s measured, gruff sing-speak, an experience that intentionally mimics a blurry, late night trip behind the wheel. “I wanted to write a song that looked like the dashboard of a 1986 C4 Corvette, a digital dash, like some Knight Rider shit,” Davis says, while Noel adds, “It vibes like you’re fucked up and cruising back home, like your life is going nowhere slowly but why care? You’re chilling, you’re in it.” The two guitarists play a different voicing of the same melody to add depth before the solo kicks in, jarring you back to life like finding a highway offramp at 2 a.m. to reset with a cup of black coffee.  

The album ends with the epic, emotional “It’s Not Just You, Murray,” a song that clocks in at over seven minutes, features a cellist and opera singer in its coda, and is named after a Martin Scorsese short film. As Luc screams a story about learning to exist in harmony with the stresses and horrors of everyday life rather than be ruled by them, grisly power chords chase after a piercing guitar line. The rhythm section slows the whole cacophony down to a determined, triumphant march, making way for the soprano and strings. “It’s about being wired to the gills, stressed, and bad shit keeps happening,” Luc says. “I get in my own way all the time, I’m my own worst enemy. And then you see it’s okay, everything’s going to be fine. There’s plenty to be stoked about, you just have to listen. And the end, with the cellist and opera singer, kind of reflects that same idea for the album: you made it, you’re here. There’s a finish line. It was awesome and beautiful to watch that idea come together all at once.”  

With the achievements of The Continental Way and the buzz surrounding its uncompromising live show, Waxed is sure to be on the brain of every serious listener of hard rock and roll in 2026 and beyond. Call it what you will — metal, sludge, thrash, hardcore, whatever — at the end of the day Waxed retains a singular focus.  

“At our essence, we’re a rock and roll band,” Davis says. “But we’re a rock and roll band in 2026. We want to do something different. We want to be chameleons. All of our influences show up on this album and it’s really representative of us growing as dudes, and being able to articulate ourselves creatively and just be us. That’s the hardest thing to do as a musician; it takes years. We’re all super fucking proud of it.”