Frankie Tyska
Laundry, from upper left: Sam Wirth, Sam Lyons, David Van Den Brandt and Ryan Jansen.
The mantra comes about halfway through “Casket,” a goofball ode to random-ass, carpe diem behavior that anchors Worm, the second release by Laundry, the Madison-area four-pack of childhood friends, anchored by the sweet and soaring vocals of Sam Lyons and Sam Wirth.
“Whatever you do, just have fun,” Lyon and Wirth croon, and it’s clear they, Ryan Jansen and David Van Den Brandt, are ready to take their own advice — or at least spend an album convincing themselves they’re ready to get over their latest round of heartbreak.
The Laundry boys have always embraced a scruffy, unvarnished bedroom-pop vibe — it’s kind of their calling card. It shows up in lo-fi effects like the voicemail snippet the band uses to lead off the catchy “Lemonhead” — listen carefully for the Def Leppard reference — and the primal anguish dripping from “Doin’ Fine,” a song that suggests that album-long pep talk isn’t hitting home as well as advertised. (Not as sure about the cartoon voice that gate-crashes “Side High.”)
Most of the bite-sized songs in this 11-track package show some strong musical growth, both in terms of harmony and in Lyons’ lyrics, which lean into heartfelt poetry more than the specific storytelling that populated the songs on Soup Girl, Laundry’s 2016 debut. Give a few extra streams to “Shimmy,” a rousing I-will-survive anthem with a roaring singalong chorus that should more than motivate the drown-your-sorrows bar crowd.
“You wear your heart on your sleeve/I’ll wear my heart in my jeans,” Wirth sings. Sounds like both good advice and an A-plus Twitter bio.
Hear the quartet live and up close at Art In on Dec. 18.
[Editor's note: We amended this story to reflect that both Wirth and Lyons provide vocals on "Casket" and "Shimmy."]
