Let's Wrestle | Nursing Home

Merge (2011)
By GARRETT MARTIN  |  June 22, 2011
3.0 3.0 Stars

lets wrestle main

Let's Wrestle are another pack of young British guitar owners, and although they haven't crafted much of an identity outside of being amiable wiseasses, that's all you need if your songs are catchy enough. This kind of noisy, overdriven, guitar-heavy pop music is hardly confined to any era, but if Nursing Home came out in '92 or '93 — during that brief window when major labels let their guards down and signed legitimately good bands in a desperate search for the next Nirvana — they would've gotten at least as much radio play as Eugenius or Teenage Fanclub. Lyrically, Nursing Home combines the intelligent snark of Art Brut and the teenage fixation of "Blue Album"–era Weezer with songs about playing computer games in the suburbs and hanging out with friends. The production from Steve Albini ensures that it's not too slick or processed. These short, humble pop songs amble along like the Wedding Present if David Gedge had a wrist injury that cut his inhuman strumming speed in half.
  Topics: CD Reviews , Music, Steve Albini, CD reviews,  More more >
| More

Most Popular
Blogs
 More: Phlog  |  Music  |  Film  |  Books  |  Politics  |  Media  |  Election '08  |  Free Speech  |  All Blogs
CURRENT CONTESTS
 All Promotions . . .
ARTICLES BY GARRETT MARTIN
Share this entry with Delicious
  •   ALLO DARLIN' | EUROPE  |  April 10, 2012
    It's good to hear a band grow. Like Allo Darlin's first effort, Europe is full of catchy pop songs, and Elizabeth Morris's vocals are still heart-tuggingly direct and intimate.
  •   CEREMONY | ZOO  |  March 13, 2012
    Ceremony aren't as intellectual or dryly hilarious as Wire and don't attempt a comparable stylistic variety, but the raucous Zoo is a fine tribute to Wire's heavier side, alternating between powerful, lumbering riffs and manic splatters of guitar noise.
  •   THE MAGNETIC FIELDS | LOVE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA  |  February 28, 2012
    The Magnetic Fields' last three albums all eschewed the synthesizers that typified their sound in the '90s, but Fields main man Stephin Merritt makes up for it on Love at the Bottom of the Sea, where he deploys at least 10 albums' worth of synths in a brisk 35 minutes.
  •   GUIDED BY VOICES | LET'S GO EAT THE FACTORY  |  January 11, 2012
    The GBV name on Let's Go Eat the Factory' s label indicates two things to those fans: this is the first record to feature the "classic" Bee Thousand/Alien Lanes line-up since 1996, and this is the first Pollard album to deserve the GBV moniker since the break-up.
  •   BIG TROUBLES | ROMANTIC COMEDY  |  October 12, 2011
    I was worried when I heard that '80s jangle-pop maestro Mitch Easter was producing Big Troubles' second album.

 See all articles by: GARRETT MARTIN

LATEST SLIDESHOWS

All Slideshows