Uhh…
Hi. Hello. First off, allow me to convey my sincerest apologies for being so unacceptably delinquent in my communications. Somewhere in the back of my head I’ve known full well that you’re spending your days refreshing this blog page, and even so - maybe because of the mental anguish it causes me to acknowledge it head-on - I choose to go about my day not generating any new content, doing other things, leading a “productive life,” and leave you, dear reader, fan of music, hanging in the lurch with nary a word to read. It’s not right, and I know that, and again: I’m sorry.
But worry yourself no longer - I’m back! Somehow, I skipped 2024 entirely, so it seems like I should provide some sort of update…but, like…it’s been so long. Where to start? Oh, oh: we played a killer show at Eddie’s Attic in August! Maybe our best show yet? I didn’t catch any reviews in the local rags, so it’s a hard claim to verify, but it’s also one that’s likely to go uncontested for the same reason, so yeah, here it is in print: it was our best show yet, goddammit. We crushed. We had f’n three-part harmonies, we played some new songs, and we really rediscovered that musical joie de vivre that’s the driving force behind playing these shows in the first place. We played some other shows during 2024 too, but I don’t remember them as well. They were probably great, but not as great as Eddie’s.
Hmm…mm……….oh! Rob Lawrence, erstwhile drummer for defunct power-pop outfit Zero Beach, has hitched his wagon to the Wirelight star! We welcome him With Arms Wide Open (under the sunlight), just as we miss original drummer Chris Wilson, although we know Chris is in a place with golden streets (he’s fine, I just wanted to keep referencing Creed).
What else is crucial for you to know in March of 2025? Well, I put a quick ‘n dirty l’il EP in December containing two songs that I dug out of the archive and glowed up for ya. “Acting” is one of the very first songs I ever committed to tape, and it’s gone through a few iterations, the first of which was tracked in my childhood bedroom in 2004, and the second of which was the subject of a project for a studio class I took in college. Neither version really did the song justice (although they’re both pristine objects of curiosity that perfectly encapsulate where I was in my journey as a mixing engineer at the time), so this one’s meant to be the definitive, final, I’m-seriously-done-recording-this-song (but, like, for real this time) version. I still think it’s a good song, although as time wears on, it definitely feels more and more, y’know, 2004.
What’s that? You want to hear the original version? Well…okay…
The other track on the Acting EP is “Set Me Down”, and we can trace that one to Augusta, Georgia in the year 2012, where I set up a makeshift “studio” consisting of a single microphone connected to a basic interface in the dead center of a cavernous, echoing loft apartment. Same deal as “Acting”: I always thought the song was cool, and I did not capture its potential in that apartment (I did capture a lot of room sound and air-conditioning, though). This version is way more dynamic and smooth, in part due to the textures I was able to pull from the Nord synth that band-member Lana Sims so kindly allowed me to borrow for a time, and in part due to the exemplary bass stylings of Deke Spears (who also appears on “Acting”).
Protip: The original version of “Set Me Down” is still on Spotify, but I reclassified it as a demo!
That about catches us up. If you’re still with me, you’re probably wondering what might be on the calendar for the rest of this year, and I’m pleased to tell you….some stuff! There’s some stuff on the calendar! We’re talkin’ new music, we’re talkin’ shows, we’re maybe even talkin’ ::gasp:: merch?! Well, music and shows for sure; merch…maybe. I actually just made up the merch thing - I have nothing planned there. We’re aggregating material for a new LP (two songs in the bag, lots to go), and while I don’t want to set impossible expectations, it just might be the best one yet. Inside of a fortune cookie I recently ate was the message “The Wirelight’s next album will take you straight to the top, Lewis.” (That’s not true; it actually read “There’s someone standing right behind you.”)
Enough for now! I’ll try to do better about updating so that I don’t have to write these novels once a year. Better for you, better for me. Better than a big book of Betty Page pictures, even if it came with a year subscription.