Slang Editorial :: Never Underestimate The Value Of A Holla'

Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Maple Syrup Spoonfuls: Let's Wrestle, The Band, And "I Won't Lie to You"

"I don't know but I am winning
And I expect that I shall be winning
For the rest of my days"

I am not a man who pretends to completely understand himself. I try, yes, but the answers that I seek--or even the questions I might want ask to help me get to the answers--frequently elude me.

This is ok, however, because Umberto, God of Unitarians , created pop music***, which shall forever provide me with diversions from the heaviness of life. And since, I have more than my fair share of weltschmerz, I am constantly on the search for pop songs that make my heart itch and my eyes water. By "pop songs", I mean not necessarily Kelly Clarkson slick hits--in fact, preferably I don't mean those--but infectiously crafted nuggets of the best ratio of sweet to hearty fulfillment. In other words, I am looking not for high fructose corn syrup but for pure natural Vermont maple syrup.

I recognize the arbitrariness of these distinctions to some people--to some, sweetness is never all that exciting, and to others there's no difference between chemically manufactured and naturally produced sugar highs. I don't really care.

In this soon-to-be ongoing series, I will begin pointing out pop songs I encounter who fit my decidedly bullshit maple syrup criteria. But "of nature" or not, rest assured any song highlighted falls under the classification of "I cannot stop myself from listening to this again today."

And so....

BOOM!

AMERICA!

LET'S FUCKING WRESTLE!!

Drumroll.... and so, yes, the inaugural Maple Syrup Delights entry is the song "I Won't Lie to You", by UK indiepopsters Let's Wrestle. And really... all eight of the songs they've released so far on their EP and single.

I was exposed to Let's Wrestle by "natural pop" (nat-pop) savant Hot Doorknobs a few months ago when "Lie to You" appeared on Sunday afternoon playlist. At the time, I definitely enjoyed it and perked up enough to ask, "Oh yeah?", but nonetheless, given the quantity of new music running through our house daily, it didn't stick either. POP FAIL!

Flash forward to Thursday, March 13: I am walking to Monsta Island Basement, one of many Brooklyn Todd P venues, with Doorknobs, Mike Slumberland, Lil Beaumont, and Cabbie M to see Cause Co-Motion! and this little Brit band opening for the Pains the next night at the Bell House@@ (also playing were Woods, who I've never heard but who I've been told I will like). Cause-Co I knew well, as I have seen many times over the years and they are relatively fun and, oddly safe know-what-to-expect scene, and Cabbie was psyched for Woods, but Doorknobs gently reminded me that my money needed to be on Let's Wrestle.

And, of course, right he was: Cause-Co were more precisely what I expected than perhaps any shitshow basement performance I've ever seen (hard to read this as a compliment), and, much to Cabbie's chagrin, we actually missed all of the Woods set... but Let's Wrestle: FUCK. So surprisingly wonderful!

Though I wasn't really able to connect any specific songs to the band prior to hearing them play out, I did at least remember vaguely Alex telling me about them previously, and upon hearing the first song I was suddenly hit by a flood of recognition that I DID remember them and that I couldn't possibly believe that the voice I was hearing was coming out of the mouth of the young boy singing in front of me.

And as you can see in the photo above, Let's Wrestle look like kids. Rock kids, sure, but kids absolutely. And especially in the dark and kid-filled environment of the Monsta Island basement, these guys just looked like lil' lads--the drummer with his peach-stache fuzz, 17; the cute leather-clad bass player, 16; and the shaggy-haired babyfat guitarist, maybe 15. I expected nothing less than a teenage yelpfest upon seeing them take the stage and was stunned, amused, and then immediately and profoundly in love when I instead got a slightly-more-mature (and just as good if not better) 1990s show.

Let's Wrestle at the Bell House, March 14 2009, opening for The Pains (not the show being described now)

But seriously--I can't overstate enough how taken aback I was to hear the deep tenor of singer Wesley Gonzales's voice as he let loose on the opening number, "Song for Man with Pica Syndrome". Shockingly full and mature-sounding, seeing him perform is almost jarring, because his man-voice sounds impossibly incongruous to the tubby teenage body that stands before you. This fact is most significant because Wes's voice--its tone, depth, confidence--is one of the most compelling explanations for Let's Wrestle's majesty, and--leaving aside the aforementioned incongruity of appearances--it has the remarkable effect of sounding completely familiar to the canon of great rock and roll and yet not-quite-placeable as far as influences go. In some way this might help explain the "can't quite place it" vibe of Let's Wrestle's music as whole--why I hear them and think, "God they've studied everyone I love!" and yet not be able to name any bands that they actually sound like. Perhaps minus the pipes, the tunes would become instantly familiar or even boring (just speculating here, not statement-izing).

But, to their credit, most likely not. The distinctive sound of Let's Wrestle goes beyond their unique vocal stylings, as the other significantly distinctive musical feature about the band's tunes is the dextrous and nonstop stream of 1/16 notes$$$$$ from bassist Mike Lightning that work to propel each song endlessly forward. The bass playing sticks to the high end of the treble-ier D and G , and in doing so creates lines that I believe might be described as "bass-led". After seeing them at Monsta Island, I speculate that each member of Let's Wrestle has above average natural ability, and perhaps best of them all is bassist Lightning. The first memory of I have of them that night is the band coming on-stage to tune up a few minutes before going on and Mike immediately beginning to play bass along with whatever random song was playing from the PA. This wasn't crazy or anything, but it was no Weezer song and you could just see the look in his eyes that said everything about who he was and what he could do.

The increasingly long of the story is that the show was completely and absolutely great, particularly in the numbers "Music is My Girlfriend", "I'm In Fighting Mode", "Pica Syndrome" and, best of all, their flagship single "I Won't Lie to You", about as perfect as an indiepop ROCK SONG you'll hear this decade. Let's Wrestle are at their best when they stay away from trad-punk and stick toward the off-kilter fast-bass syrup of these three tracks; and interestingly, the only weak track of the eight is the "band-titled song"^^^^^^ "Let's (Fucking) Wrestle", which more or less plays like a mostly standand forgettable footie-punk pub chant.

At the time I saw them, I hadn't yet digested any of their recordings, so I can't say exactly what they played or didn't play during the show(s), but of the eight previously referenced recorded tracks on their In Loving Memory Of... EP and the Let's Wrestle/I'm In Fighting Mode 7" that I've listened to since, there is no question that "Music is My Girlfriend" and, especially, "I Won't Lie to You" stand out as the best among bests.

Perhaps it just resonates with me because, well, music is my girlfriend, but the chorus of the former has been ringing in my head for two weeks now and I don't want it to leave. Whatever it is that I seem to be doing--cooking, pumping my bike up a hill, furiously dashing off a letter to the Foreign Minister of the Czech Republic&&&--it just goes "ringing ringing ringing on". In the best way imaginable.

But, don't get it twisted: "I Won't Lie to You" is THE MOTHERFUCKING JAM. It is one of those songs you will hear as a listener and realize that few songs you will ever hear again will outdo or even compare to it. And if you hear it is as its author, you will realize that you never again write anything to top it.

HAN SOLO, I AM NOT FUCKING AROUND HERE. THE FUCKING JAM!

I am literally unable to speak in a language of a letter-based words to describe in full why exactly this song is so great. It has a GREAT melody. The bass playing runs fast to their strengths but slowed down and bouncing just enough as to achieve "Airport Lounge" level success. And Wes's voice! FUCK! It's most definitely the best he can ever hope it will sound. Rich, deep, and assured, yet urgent enough to deliver the message with near-unignorable desperation that pop can save lives if you open your ears and heart to its infinite futures. Have I peed all over this one enough yet? I still have an entire bucket of slobber in my room i've been collecting for the past two weeks since I first heard it. According to mere Last.fm tracking I've listened to it 29 times since, which, to use a Bill James analogy of the officially listed weight of Cecil Fielder, begs the question of what would happen if I put the other foot on the scale.

Anyway, if you have it this far, I have shit far too much Let's Wrestle on your face for either of us to be comfortable anymore. Let me drop these last loads and be done with it now:

MP3s! Listen!
Let's Wrestle - "I Won't Lie To You"
Let's Wrestle - "Music is My Girlfriend"
Let's Wrestle - "Song For the Man With Pica Syndrome"

Mike Lightning of Let's Wrestle, March 14 2009, opening for The Pains

Wes Gonzales of Let's Wrestle, March 14 2009, opening for The Pains

And here is the video for "I Won't Lie to You":

And here is apparently some shitty quality video of Let's Wrestle at Monsta Island:

PEACE! More Maple Syrup to come, in less long form!

Love,
JB

NOTES:
*** - I am actually not aware of a god of any kind for Unitarians, or any Unitarians that believe in a god for that matter####. Surely though, if he or she existed, I've no doubt that Umberto, or Ursula or Ulysses or whoever, would have had a hand in creating pop music.
#### - Seriously! Their own flyer (click the link above to see) says, "Maybe you are uncomfortable with the idea of God... Welcome to Unitarian Universalism." I can't make this shit up. Thanks, mom, for 26 years of spiritual confusion!
@@ - My photos are from here are from this show, not the Monsta Island show. See photos of that show here.
$$$$$ - I know literally nothing about musical composition and I completely made that up. Please someone, come correct and let me know what's really going on here and why I love it so much.
^^^^^^ - "Pains of Being Pure at Heart"? "Crystal Stilts"? "Titus Andronicus"? Damn son. Though there's a funny note on this subject I hope to be able to share at some later point...
&&& - Seriously.

Labels: loved sounds, Maple Syrup Delights, mp3, music, photography

posted by Nihilist Loves Hate, Hates Everything at 3/31/2009 03:30:00 AM 2 comments

2 Comments:

Benjamin said...: This post has been removed by the author.; 3/31/2009 03:00:00 PM
Nihilist Loves Hate, Hates Everything said...: Just to be clear: I do NOT dislike the song "Let's Wrestle". It is simply the "shrimp ramen" of their output; weakest, but still, obviously, ramen.; 3/31/2009 03:00:00 PM