So, here\u2019s the thing. If you want to venture down the path of Fountains of Wayne-Ben Folds-Weezer hyper-literate, super-smartass rock and roll, you need to be really, really good at it. You need to understand exactly what makes a song like \u201cStacy\u2019s Mom\u201d or \u201cRockin\u2019 The Suburbs\u201d tick\u2014the specificity of the references, the ability to riff on and on about a topic, finding fresh, unexpected angles with every verse rather than building a song around a single punchline. You need to be able to build an entire world within a few lines and populate it with recognizable characters.<\/p>\n
And hooks. You need really good hooks.<\/p>\n
Musical partners in crime Spud Davenport (vocals, piano, keys, guitars, bass) and Charlie Recksieck (vocals, drums, keys, guitars, kazoo and theremin) make music that\u2019s very much in that Fountains-Folds vein, with a bit of an irascible Randy Newman edge as well. It\u2019s power-pop with an extra helping of sass, something that Recksieck and Davenport refer to as \u201cfun rock\u201d (sure, why not).<\/p>\n
One of the interesting things about Won<\/i> is that the emphasis tracks up front, the ones with the big-attention-getting lyrical hooks and topical references, are the ones that worked least well for me. \u201cShe Gets Loud\u201d takes an inherently funny premise\u2014the noisy lover\u2014and never really develops it. It\u2019s a one-joke song that runs four minutes and tragically fails to reach an, um, satisfying conclusion; a tale like this really needs a dramatic arc that leads to a clever final twist, and both are missing. This failure to build on the initial premise leaves the whole thing feeling like an overlong fart joke; you laugh once early on and then wait for it to be over.<\/p>\n
Second track \u201cThese Goddamn Devices\u201d tries to capture the zeitgeist with an ode the frustrations of technology\u2014\u201cIt\u2019s progress in reverse\u201d\u2014but ends up feeling rather obvious. \u201cHater\u201d makes some apt observations, e.g. \u201cThese days there\u2019s so much mediocrity,\u201d along the way, as does the distinctly Darwinian \u201cLaw Of The Jungle,\u201d which makes a winking argument for thinning the herd of the human race (\u201cThey wouldn\u2019t last a day on their own \/ If tigers were around\u201d). <\/p>\n
\u201cTrophies\u201d is where Won<\/i> begins to blossom. At first it feels a bit predictable in the way it takes on the \u201cparticipation trophy\u201d mentality (\u201cYou don\u2019t get a trophy \/ Just for showing up\u201d), but then three minutes in the song detours into an extended, piano-based bridge in which the boys fire back with pointed lines like \u201cThe hero stays out of the spotlight,\u201d before circling back. It\u2019s a funny song with a point, and one that locates the critical balance point between snark and sincerity and shows real creativity to its changes. <\/p>\n
From there, \u201cMuseums\u201d pokes at intellectual pretension in a rather deadpan way and is all the more effective for that. \u201cAwkward Town\u201d opens with a pretty piano melody before diving into a tune about \u201can earthbound planet Pluto\u201d\u2014a town that gets no respect, and all the people living there who think they\u2019re too good for it. <\/p>\n
The duo enlists horns to add welcome dimension and playfulness to several tunes here, including \u201cLaw Of The Jungle,\u201d \u201cMuseums,\u201d \u201cAwkward Town,\u201d a well-arranged take on Harry Nilsson\u2019s \u201cOld Forgotten Solider\u201d (the one cover here), and closer \u201cLawnchairs,\u201d a tune about the simple joys of viewing the apocalypse from a comfy seat.<\/p>\n
In the end, one-note jokes like \u201cShe Gets Loud\u201d and \u201c24\/8 Bar Song\u201d serve to make you appreciate that much more what a band like Fountains Of Wayne does; their songs feature fully-realized, three-dimensional characters like you might find in a good novel, they never indulge in easy stereotypes, and they always seem to balance humor with earnestness. That takes a kind of dedication to craft that Leaders In The Clubhouse seem capable of, but demonstrate only intermittently here. <\/p>\n
The point of these comparisons is not to criticize Leaders, but to underscore just how difficult it is to pull this type of music off successfully. They say \u201ccomedy is hard\u201d; so is \u201cfun rock.\u201d In the end, Won<\/i> won me over with its amiably shaggy vibe; on the whole, it\u2019s an enjoyable romp that\u2019s full of exuberant flair and promise for the future. I\u2019m looking forward to hearing more from Davenport and Recksieck. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":32455,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9683],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-44214","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-leaders-in-the-clubhouse","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44214"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}