Listen To The Fuzzy Guitar Pop of American Wrestlers (Show Tonight!)
American Wrestlers’ mastermind Gary McClure moved to the United States from Scotland a couple of years ago after his Manchester, England based band Working For a Nuclear Free City ended and he met his wife and bandmate Bridgette Imperial. After gaining some traction with a self recorded anonymous set of songs (2015’s self titled album) the project was picked up by Fat Possum and the one man band was able to enter full band territory with the second album Goodbye Terrible Youth which came out almost a month ago. Fuzzy but anthemic melodies kick off the 9 track album with the back to back punch of “Vote Thatcher” and “Give Up”. Jangly hints at McClure’s shoegaze past in tracks like “Hello, Dear” permeate the record creating lots of great hazy guitar and keyboard textures throughout. Sometimes the band plays things a little more straight on songs like the almost title track “Terrible Youth” and the 80s synthpop tinged verses “Blind Kids”. The tape hiss and drum machines of the first album are gone but the concepts shine with a full band to back up the songs. The band has been getting lots of great press recently and had a number of shows with some higher profile bands so catch them small while you can.
-Adam
American Wrestlers play the 7th Street Entry tonight with Varsity from Chicago. More info here.
