Years before he learned to transfix a crowd — first as a trophy-winning college football athlete, then as the GRAMMY-nominated, platinum-selling songwriter behind projects like NEEDTOBREATHE and Wilder Woods — Bear Rinehart spent hours at his grandmother’s house, captivated by the odd keepsakes in her curio cabinet. He gathers together a similar collection of personal influences with Curioso, his third album as Wilder Woods. It’s a genre-bending mix of anthemic American music, exploring everything from slow-cooked soul to atmospheric indie-folk to stomping, four-on-the-floor rock & roll. Holding that all-encompassing sound together is the enthusiasm of a longtime songwriter who’s still eager to stretch his legs and cover new ground. Rinehart hasn’t just established his own sound; he’s moved beyond it, too. Curioso is his own curio cabinet: a curated showcase of the influences and experiences that have shaped him as a musician, placed on public display for the whole world to hear.
