If, as mythos has it, the best band in the world on any given night is playing in some local bar, on Wednesday, June 11, that bar might have been the Beachland Tavern in Cleveland, when Cincinnati’s Wussy headlined for a hundred or so patrons and Akron’s Dave Rich And His Enablers opened. The Beachland Tavern and adjacent Ballroom celebrated their 25th anniversary this year, and both groups have long histories with the venue: Rich noted he’d been playing there in various bands for 20 years, and Wussy said it had been at least seven since they last visited, although they pledged their fidelity: “We haven’t been seeing other towns.”
(Apologies for the collective noun there. The members of Wussy love to banter, and my notes didn’t always catch who said what. Bass player Mark Messerly joked that some people come just for the between-song “dumbassery,” and the casual, sarcastic interplay among Messerly and co-leaders Lisa Walker and Chuck Cleaver added to the evening’s charm.)
Wussy has been around nearly as long as the Beachland, and they’re perpetual underdogs, with eight uniformly excellent albums of droning, loud rock ’n’ roll loved by aging rock critics (Robert Christgau is a Wussy stan) and not enough others. Last year’s Cincinnati Ohio is one of their best, full of songs that churn and race, often built on two chords and a lot of heart. Walker and Cleaver share the lead vocals, and the best moments are when the two overlap in a back-and-forth reminiscent of Exene Cervenka and John Doe of X, such as on “Inhaler” and “Teenage Wasteland.” Walker’s voice is strong and earnest, with a tinge of country soul to it, while Cleaver’s is thinner and creakier, with a wry edge; they don’t blend so much as they generate sparks.
Amidst the psych rock of “She’s Killed Hundreds” (featuring the pedal steel of recent addition Travis Talbert), the joyful romp of “Happiness Bleeds,” the strumming crescendos of “The Great Divide” and the Pere Ubu-ish punk rock of “Pulverized,” the band bantered, often talking more to each other than to the audience. Walker said the secret of “Pizza King” is that they never practice it so they never know how it will go. (It was a highlight.) Cleaver’s comment that “We don’t really use chords” led to some comparisons to other bands: The Ramones used three chords, which is one more than Wussy favors; Walker speculated that they had something in common with Spiritualized. They dissed Manhattan Transfer and Bob Seger. Cleaver told a funny story about his near-success with the Ass Ponys in the ’90s when they were signed to A&M Records and went to a major-label schmoozefest and he got mistaken for Blues Traveler’s John Popper (“the least fuckable person on earth,” he said with dismay), which lead to some debate on the merits of “Run-Around.” After a long, somber version of “Little Miami” that featured some of Walker’s most impressive vocals of the night, Cleaver noted it was his favorite Wussy song.
Wussy was casually locked-in and brilliant, and each song hit just right, including a surprisingly fitting encore cover of Warren Zevon’s “Play It All Night Long,” an ode to bar bands everywhere that’s as bitter as it is loving.
Openers Dave Rich And His Enablers are an assemblage of Akron lifers (including, until recently, Chris Butler of the Waitresses on drums). Rich spent some time in Doug Gillard’s solo band outside of Guided By Voices, and since starting to record at home during the pandemic, he’s taken after GBV and released multiple annual albums of punchy power pop, heartland rock and zippy punk: a bit of Replacements, a bit of Tommy Keene, some GBV.
“I’ve had a shitty year, and I’m excited to yell about it for you,” Rich said early on. And the set conveyed the catharsis he sought, none more so than the last song, which Rich introduced as a new one they had been working on. He said it reminded him of some other song he couldn’t place and asked the audience for help identifying it. And then they launched into an amped-up rendition of Sonny Curtis’s oft-covered “I Fought The Law.” It was an indelible, perfect bar-band moment.
—Steve Klinge
