Labels: Sea Owl
Review by: Dan Bennett
I’ve spent most of the last year pretty much moaning about the decline in great indie rock and
then out of nowhere, two quality releases land on my door step with Wonderswan’s I Wish I Was
Deep Instead of Just Macho being one.
IWIWDIOJM was recorded entirely on 4 track, something that is reflected in the production of the
music, something that shouldn’t deter you however, as it suits it to a tee. Deep amongst the tape
hiss and tinny production are some brilliant songs that benefit from its lo-fi-ness, adding a splash
of authenticity to its sound.
Whilst there are 8 tracks in total on the tape, only 4 can be classed as “songs’ so to speak. The
others serve as musical interludes between tracks, sloppy yet brilliant tracks that sound straight
out of the rehearsal room. This shows the band on a more experimental and freeform level, a nice
companion to the poppy main body of songs.
Wonderswan pay homage to some of the best bands of the genre on IWIWDIOJM (even the
abbreviation is a mouthful), bands such as Seafood, Dinosaur Jr and the more tuneful aspects of
Sonic Youth, the latter being more prevailing in the instrumental “jam’ tracks. All these influences
combined produce an end result that’s a gutsy effort to try and rekindle what appears to be a
dying style, a rawkus mixed bag of material to try and disrupt the current state of over polished
indie rock.
Not only is this a great release, the packaging is somewhat special too. A lot of effort has gone
into the packaging (much like all Sea Owl releases), a paper sleeve that folds out into a beach
changing hut, all sealed with a nautical piece of string. Knob on.