Wet Leg Prove What the Buzz Is All About on Thursday Night at Brooklyn Steel
March 11, 2022
Wet Leg – Brooklyn Steel – March 10, 2022
Wet Leg, from the Isle of Wight, are the kind of band that seemingly comes out of nowhere and hits the radar with a big, buzzy pow—they’re upon you (you’re their prey) before you’ve even realized. After their New York City debut in December, their Thursday show at Brooklyn Steel was originally scheduled for Music Hall of Williamsburg, and it quickly became clear that they’d go bigger, sooner. (And all that after, what, just five-or-eight-or-how-many commercially available songs to listen to ahead of their self-titled debut full-length arriving on April 8?)
Wet Leg are the kind of band that attacks with guitar-band fury, stinging-staccato lyrics and a blasé-but-not-disinterested vocal pattern that channels angst but also feels like a kiss-off to life’s various absurdities. They can rhyme “life is hard” with “credit card” or acquit the Mean Girls ape, “Would you like us to assign someone to butter your muffin?” with zero uncertainty. (And they did, near the end of their raucous set at Brooklyn Steel, during fan-favorite “Chaise Longue.”)
Wet Leg are also already the kind of band that can fill up and rock a room like a pinball machine—the room was full in every sense: packed, wall to wall with boogieing fans, fizzing with jittery energy as the band roared through single after single—“Angelica,” “Too Late Now,” “Oh No,” “Wet Dream”—as if each had been a chart-topper for years, and reacted the same to the songs many hadn’t yet heard, much of which will be on the upcoming album.
Rhian Teasdale, Hester Chambers and their band have gotten their show bedspring-tight-’n’-coiled—even when performing, as they did for the past few shows, without their regular drummer—and they’ve figured out how to own increasingly bigger rooms, driving up the thud-thud bass to whack every corner of the cavernous Steel. The music blasts by, but it isn’t light. The sung lyrics crackle, and there’s nothing airy about any of the delivery. They were on for what we’ll loosely call an hour, and summons for more songs got a talk-to-the-hand. It wasn’t mean-spirited, it’s just how they roll. You were in the room for the beginning of this big, big moment for them, and that’s wild, right? —Chad Berndtson | @Cberndtson
(Wet Leg play Underground Arts tomorrow night in Philadelphia.)
Photos courtesy of Adela Loconte | www.adelaloconte.com
