Live: Wussy @ Mercury Lounge 8.11.12

pic by acidjack, stolen w/apologies

Wussy shows are not generally missed by the JS-NYC franchise and as this run through town ended up being at NYC's best live venue, pains were taken to insure our presence, especially in light of our heroes being inexplicable openers for Philly's (unkn)own Low Cut Connie. Props should be given to LCG for facilitating Wussy's presence, as evidently they had some issues getting noticed/booked at Mercury previously.

I would venture it won't be an issue next time, as Wussy filled the room with equal parts fan and rock in their usual time-honored fashion. Col and I rolled in, said hi to the lovely Essie and posted up just before things jumped off for a ten song run with Funeral Dress. The opening slot precluded things stretching out, but Chuck did offer to show his pecker (quote) to a guy celebrating his birthday, so the teaser set wasn't a total loss. The new Strawberry got a decent amount of love, including a pretty aces swing through Grand Champion Steer. Sadly, no Little Miami, but I expect we'll get Wussy back for a headlining slot soon, especially after their run of dates opening for The Afghan Whigs.

If you missed the show, hopes are high for your having one hell of a good excuse, but you can ease the pain by grabbing the recording the estimable NYCTaper has kindly made available for your downloading pleasure. Get the recording here and use this link keep track of all other things Wussy.

R

Live: Wussy with The Fervor @ Cake Shop 4.16.10

The rumored Hold Steady shows had taken precedence as I approached what I considered my own personal birthday weekend. While that is somewhat selfish (and with apologies to Sizzla, Brandon So Hideous, and my cousin Tom) I rarely indulge in such things, so others of the prospectively offended demographic are invited to litigate acccordingly. As said weekend approached, I happened to realize that the good folk of Wussy were passing through for another one of what is becoming regular Cake Shop shows.

I've spent a lot of time at Cake Shop in the last year or so and I can aver two things: they book good shows, and getting caught in the line of fire of their PA speakers is one of the harshest things I've ever encountered in a club. You have to work for it, but location is everything there. I arrived at the tail end of The Fervor and was pretty impressed. They got a little jammy, but the female who fronts the band (as well as playing keys) sure can sing. There is evidently a split with our Wussy heroes that sounds like it's well worth picking up.

Wussy were up in fairly short order and proceeded to throw down in their time-honored fashion. Chuck and Lisa are quite a couple, both visually and musically, and the chemistry seems to be working for the band. They've been breaking in a new drummer for a bit, but you wouldn't know it by listening. The gender change is a little more obvious, but it certainly hasn't impacted Wussy to the negative. They drew a decent crowd and got a couple encores, so it would appear that I'm not the only one in NYC beside Bob Christgau who is sweet on these kids. The set list is below. It, along with the photo above and the recording of the show you can get here were all stolen from the estimable nyctaper, whose site you should peruse early and often. Thanks and apologies to him. Once you get back from there, head on over to the Wussy web presence here and see if you're lucky enough to have the kids coming through your town soon.

R

01 Funeral Dress [false start]

02 Funeral Dress

03 Happiness Bleeds

04 [banter]

05 Crooked

06 [banter]

07 Sun Giant Says Hey

08 Do Do Do Do

09 [banter]

10 Breakfast in Bed (Hinton/Fritts)

11 [banter/monitors]

12 Death By Misadventure

13 Muscle Cars

14 Airborne

15 Yellow Cotton Dress

16 Fly Fly Fly

17 Rigor Mortis

18 [encore break/banter]

19 Soak It Up

20 [banter]

21 Jonah

22 [banter]

23 Maglite

24 [second encore break]

25 Don't Leave Just Now

Live Link

Live: Wussy @ Cake Shop 6.16.9

As the Avendon-ian snapshottery so eloquently evinces. Wussy were back in town, playing my new home away from home Cake Shop with Doug Gillard and Chris Brokaw. I like me some Wussy, and was pretty excited at the prospect of hearing them play some of the new stuff off their awesome new self-titled record.

I showed in time to catch a good part of Doug Gillard's set. He was playing in an ad-hoc duo format with his guitar player, as his rhythm section was called out of town, but still managed to wow the small crowd that turned up. He's got a new record out called Call From Restricted that I've not heard, but judging from the material he played, it sounds like it's pretty damn good.

Wussy were batting in the middle slot, which was more than fine with me. I enjoy Chris Brokaw in all of his incarnations, but it had been a couple weeks in a row where I had been out every night and I was looking forward to a quiet wind-down to the evening. Wussy have a new drummer, which was a mild bummer, but he seemed to have had no problems assimilating into the band's ranks, as Wussy set the place on fire. It seemed like the Ohio ex-pat community was out in force. The band seemed a little taken aback about the crowd being so enthusiastic on a school night, but were far from unappreciative, feeding off the crowd and giving it back tenfold.

The set list is pictured, although in retrospect I'm not sure how accurate it is. Regardless, suffice to say that the kids rocked. Lisa was in fine voice and as lovely to look at as always.

Chuck was his usual acerbic self, although I will admit to catching unnatural feelings being around that much of a big hunk of man. My issues aside, he and Lisa make for a fine rock and roll couple. Paired with rest of Wussy, they make for one heck of rock franchise. Think John and Exene if they came from Cincinatti rather than L.A. It's so good. You would do well to get off your duff and check them out the next time they pass through town.

Check out Wussy next time they come through your town, hopefully towards the end of the summer. You plan your schedule using this handy link. Buy the stellar new record Wussy here and thank me later.

R

Wussy tonight and tomorrow!

Hey Kids:

If you have ears (and aren't training a Yorkie or something) you should seriously consider seeing the mighty Wussy play in town tonight at Cake Shop and tomorrow out in Brooklyn at Union Hall. Buy the new record while you're at it.

R

new Wussy!!

It's shaping up to be a pretty good spring for new releases, evinced in no small part by the fact that Columbus, OH purveyors of awesomeness Wussy have a new record out on Shake It!. Full-length number three is simply called Wussy. There are a dozen songs this time around, none of which do anything to dispel the notion that Wussy is the Midwest version of X. Chuck still isn't Sam Cooke, but why would you want him to be? Lisa's voice is the Coke to his Jack and the two are just as lovely together.

There have been some minor line-up changes in Team Wussy since their last release, with drummer Dawn Burman leaving and Joe Klug from Staggering Statistics stepping into the breach. The switch hasn't changed the Wussy sound much from it's bedrock awesomeness. If you liked them before, there is still a good amount of Velvet Underground drone and reverb action to go with the soaring slide sweeps, especially on Magic Words. Wussy is good, really good in fact. Look forward to me writing this up as much as I can. 

Once it relaunches, there will be something on the new Skyscraper web presence about Wussy, so I won't go too much into the specifics, but suffice to say that there are songs called This Will Not End Well, Maglite, and Misadventure. Anyone familiar with the Wussy catalog will take these titles as comfortable thematic signs. Oh, and if you're an older Ass Ponys fan that's on the fence, know that Maglite features a crossbow pretty prominently in the narrative. Wussy will be on tour behind Wussy starting the end of May. They'll be at Cake Shop with Chris Brokaw on 5/16 and Union Hall at 5/17, so mark your calendars. If you feel the need to try it before you buy it, you can listen to tracks from Wussy here. Why postpone joy, you can pick up a copy like JS-NYC did via this handy link. Thank me later and look out for the Skyscraper review soon.

R