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

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