Wonderlick 'Topless At The Arco Arena' album

Wonderlick's Tim Quirk is an artist. It must be true, because Tina Weymouth of the Talking Heads said so. Recalls Quirk, "I once got in a drunken debate with her about sampling, during the course of which she told me she didn't think I was a real artist. Later on she apologized by hugging me for an uncomfortably long time, and whispered the following in my ear--and I'm not making this up--'You are an artist. And you know what it's like on a major label. It's like they stick an umbrella up your ass. And then they open it. And you just have to walk down the street like nothing's wrong.' Her husband, Chris Frantz, was standing behind her, smiling at me as though he were used to moments like this."

The major label stint Weymouth refers to was another life ago when Quirk and Jay Blumenfield, the other half of Wonderlick, were themselves half of the alterna-snark outfit Too Much Joy. That band had: A) a minor proto-modern-rock radio hit with "Crush Story," B) a unwavering adoration of Joe Strummer and, C) a penchant for legal run-ins that never translated commensurately from press to record sales. But hey, if the hand isn't going to feed you, might as well keep biting it.

TMJ went on hiatus in 1997 as real life rudely encroached on their rock 'n' fantasy. But Quirk and Blumenfield, friends and bandmates since before they could drive, never completely let go. And, in the early Aughties, they started recording tracks on their own as Wonderlick. And they gave the songs away for free on their website. As an afterthought, they included a Paypal link allowing people to donate money. Of their own volition. However much they wanted, if they wanted.

"We weren't trying to make money, or even be noticed. We just wanted to make music for the fun of it again," Blumenfield says. But fans kept donating, which enabled the duo to keep recording, and in 2002, the free (but revenue-generating) tracks became Wonderlick's self-titled debut, a darkish pop record about life and death. Think Tolstoy, but with guitars and whimsy.

It's taken seven years--these are people with actual jobs (Blumenfield a TV producer and Quirk a VP at Rhapsody) and families and stuff after all--but the pair is finally following up the debut with Topless at the Arco Arena. Both the album's name and leitmotif come from an essay, included in the liner notes, by Quirk about the moment where theater, commerce, exploitation, possibility, liberation, and, the majesty of rock all coalesced together in the singular image of a giant pair of exposed breasts (female ones) on a massive video screen.

Titties. Awesome.

The gap between records works in favor of Topless as it doesn't sound the product of a particular narrow slice of time, mostly because, well, it's not. Too many things change over that period--musically, emotionally, socially. So, whereas there's a nice thematic singularity to Topless, musically it's a gallimaufry of twists and surprises. The cheeky sonic meta-aping of Xeroxed sound-alikes in "This Song is a Commercial." The surprisingly ballad-esque tempo of the self-loving "Fuck Yeah!" The cyclical relevancy of the pop-sprawl behind "We Run The World." The record definitely sounds like the work of the same two guys. But it never sounds the same.

So, yes, hints of their old snark remain, but one of the secret by-products of acquiescing to maturity is that it offers more nuanced ways to be subversive. So the pun gives way to the metaphor, the sarcastic humor to the symbolism.

It's Wonderlick focusing on the 'art' part of 'smartass,' while not forgetting to let the music do as much talking as the lyrics. And they both speak in compelling tongues.

Credits: Michael Bertin

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Wonderlick - Topless At The Arco Arena

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