Second super group in a row. This week Brandon and Pacific Northwest correspondent, Natalie Snoyman, dig into Wild Flag’s eponymous debut. Carrie Brownstein and Janet Weiss, two-thirds of honest-to-God super group Sleater-Kinney, have joined forces with Mary Timony of Helium and Rebecca Cole of The Minders to form this Sleater-Kinney simulacrum. In Brandon’s first letter to Natalie, he compares Sleater-Kinney to Michael Jordan. Sorry, Portland. Too soon?
Hear full Wild Flag album stream!
Wild Flag – “Romance”
From: Brandon Hall
To: Natalie Snoyman
Natalie! I miss you. It’s been almost a year since we saw Wild Flag at Spaceland in LA. A year since I shouted out, “Hey Janet!” as Janet Weiss, walked by me, and turned, surprised, to say “Hi” to no one because I had already turned away in embarrassment. A year since I stared at Carrie Brownstein across the room watching the opener, debating for a good thirty minutes whether or not to approach her. To my credit, I let the woman/superhero be. And it’s been a year since we walked out of that show all geeked out about what a totally rocking, kick-ass experience that was. That’s how I felt, anyway. Unless you were just being nice to me, a definite possibility, I think you felt the same way.
And I think it might have been only their second show ever! Obviously, I suppose we shouldn’t have been surprised. This is another pseudo-super group featuring some of the best ladies in the business for the past 20 years. Carrie and Janet from the tragically disbanded Sleater-Kinney, Mary Timony, formerly of Helium, sharing vocals, song-writing, and guitar-shredding duties, and The Minders’ Rebecca Cole working the keys. If these women had never met and just decided to jam together one day, it’d probably still be pretty great. Worth noting, also, is that this album was recorded live except for the vocals in a place called The Hangar, a Sacramento recording studio that sometimes doubles as a skate park! Before this album was released for streaming, I had been digging around for some early Wild Flag songs and came across a live bootleg that doesn’t sound totally unlike their debut, which, of course, has decidedly less applause, but otherwise doesn’t feel much less live.
I could go on at length about Carrie and Janet. Since Sleater-Kinney, Carrie has taken over the world as a writer, blogger, actor, comedienne, and joined forces with Fred Armisen to make the internet sketch show ThunderAnt, and the IFC show, Portlandia. Janet didn’t miss a beat, immediately becoming one of Stephen Malkmus’s Jicks and continuing as the drummer of Quasi, not to mention getting scooped up by every huge indie band you’ve ever heard of when they find themselves suddenly in need of a fucking amazing drummer.
As for Mary Timony and Rebecca Cole, Natalie, I honestly don’t know much. I’ve never heard Helium or The Minders, and only know The Minders as a part of the Elephant 6 collective. Do you know much about these women?
Sorry. I don’t know that I needed to spend so much time talking about the actors. It’s just that Sleater-Kinney was and is one of my favorite bands. I think their last album, The Woods, was actually their best. HOW ARE YOU GOING TO LEAVE ME AFTER YOUR BEST ALBUM!? I NEEDS MOAAAAR! It was like Michael Jordan retiring after his ’93 championship. (At least I hope that’s what it’s like, because I want them to come back and be like ’96 Jordan, not old, bad knees, Wizards Jordan that I wish we could all just erase from our memories.)
And so, as a Sleater-Kinney disciple, I find myself in a weird place when listening to Wild Flag. I think a number of songs pick up where The Woods left off. The guitar solo/noise break-down in “Glass Tambourine” sounds at times almost note for note like The Woods’ “Let’s Call it Love.” “Racehorse” is an epic rocker that clocks in at six minutes and forty seconds, and that song, along with closer “Black Tiles” would have fit nicely on The Woods, though every Wild Flag song is noticeably bereft of Corin Tucker’s banshee yelp.
And that’s the thing. I can’t listen to Wild Flag without comparing them to Sleater-Kinney. Their sound is too similar and I find myself drawn to the more Sleater-Kinney-esque elements than the occasionally Go-Gos sounding pieces that you find in “Electric Band,” “Glass-Tambourine,” and a number of other songs.
In an interview with the Village Voice, Carrie said, “We’re touring a bunch, and if people show up because they like Sleater-Kinney, we’ll weed them out. We want people to come to our shows because they like WILD FLAG.”
Yeah, but I like Wild Flag because they sound like Sleater-Kinney.
What do you think, Natalie? Does Wild Flag sound like a new band to you? Is there a chance they find an identity of their own? Maybe they should try making folk music or electronica or pop. Horrible ideas all, but, otherwise, I feel like I’m just going to wish they were Sleater-Kinney as opposed to a close approximation.
“Cracked mirrors on the lawn,”
Brandon
Wild Flag is out 9/13/2011 via Merge.
Pre-order Wild Flag here
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