OK, tell me all about Wussy

Chuck Cleaver
Send Aid
Shake It
19 July 2019

Chuck Cleaver (Wussy, Ass Ponys) has been writing and performing his thoughtful, idiosyncratic songs for over thirty years, developing a cult following of devoted fans across the United States, Europe and beyond. However, this summer’s upcoming Send Aid LP (on Shake It Records) marks his first recorded solo output.

According to Cleaver, “folks have been trying to get me to do a solo record for years now”, but the thought of recording without his regular bandmates had always left him feeling a bit out-of-step. But then a prolific writing streak came along, and after Wussy had assembled their latest LPs (Forever Sounds and What Heaven Is Like), he was left with a near-album’s worth of extra material. He characterizes these solo tracks as “primarily Wussy rejects, although I wrote a couple just for this beast.”

And so.. with one track already in tow from the Wussy sessions at Ultrasuede, Cleaver aimed to craft the remaining songs with a more DIY approach that he describes as “somewhere between John Prine and Big Stick”. On Send Aid, he set out to fully explore his love of noise mixed with a stripped-down aesthetic.. then topping it off with a healthy dose of treated/doubled vocals. While a natural performer, Cleaver has always had a Lennon-esque disdain for his own singing voice, placing him in the role of reluctant frontman. But it is this vulnerability that shines through the layers of distortion and tape-delay.

Many of the off-the-cuff performances were recorded as first takes in practice spaces, engineered by frequent Wussy collaborator John Hoffman. The record’s fuzzed out edges are occasionally softened with the addition of cello, accordion, sitar or mandolin from Cleaver’s rotating backing band of friends and neighbors, who just happen to be among the best of Cincinnati’s thriving punk, indie rock and folk communities. The roster includes some of his Wussy bandmates, as well as appearances from members of Lung, Vacation, Dawg Yawp, Swim Team, Notches and Mardou. This record also marks Chuck’s final collaboration with the late (and greatly missed) mastering engineer Dave Davis; the two had worked together since the 1990s on multiple Ass Ponys and Wussy releases.

Much of Cleaver’s writing on Send Aid details the mundanity and memories of daily life, with other tracks unfolding as harrowing fictional narratives (two of Cleaver’s noted strengths). His struggles with self-doubt and pessimism are often laid bare in cheery three-chord pop format, as evidenced on the self-loathing opener “Terrible Friend”, as well as in “Bed”, in which he wards off thoughts of impending mortality with sleep: And as my time decreases / I’m sitting listening to “I Fall to Pieces” / And while the words are winding through my head / I think of all the things I should have said / Then I give up and go to bed.

Send Aid’s first single is “Anything”, an anthem to failed relationships, in which Cleaver laments, “It’s impossible, it seems, to not romanticize the past.” As if confirming his suspicions, he does just that in the final verse: Had it been a meaningless exchange, I don’t suppose I’d care / But the fuses all were lit, and bits of us were scattered everywhere / Though it’s really just my luck that I would try to find some comfort there / But I would do anything, I would do anything.

But not all is doom and gloom: In the sweet and instantly singable album closer “Folk Night at Fucky’s”, Cleaver recollects dancing around the house with his daughter as they listened to Chumbawamba’s “Tubthumping”. Throughout the record, emotions range from despair to joy.. and everything in between. There are odes to bullets dodged (“Mess”, “Devil May Care”), megalomaniacs in positions of power (“Children of the Corn”), and the dual nature of passion (“Flowers and the Devil”).

No Cleaver record would be complete without a couple of tales from haunted small-town-Ohio, which always reside somewhere between reality and horror. His ominous “The Weekend That It Happened” details a fictional account of kidnapping and murder rooted in his real-life suspicion that “bad things always happen on the weekend”. Later on the album, “The Night We Missed the Horror Show” is a riff off of a Joe Lansdale short story title with one word altered. “I really just used the title,” he explains. “The song itself has nothing to do with the story. Except that there’s an element of overwhelming dread in the original – and a similar sense of dread in the song. But it’s about being afraid of things to come. It’s kind of a toss up as to what’s more horrific – the story or real life.”

The album’s cover photos were taken by his daughter Anna Stockton, and were discovered in a moment of kismet. Cleaver had been having difficulty deciding on a cover image, when she happened to send him a batch of photos she had recently taken of his hometown Clarksville, Ohio. The first image he pulled up was of a now-defunct business well-known to him from his childhood. He knew immediately it would be the cover. According to Cleaver, “It’s a former furniture store that just happened to be where I was waiting on the school bus one morning in the 70s, when the owner asked if I could go up the street to check on the town barber. I found him, but he was long dead and catfish-grey. It was not a pleasant memory.” As for the title, it “came from a sign that’s on the door. It’s still there.”

The back cover, also a photo by Stockton, depicts the decaying remains of Valley Steel, also in Clarksville – a once thriving mill that ceased to exist when the railroad disappeared from the region. “It’s by the #8 trestle” according to Cleaver (Ass Ponys fans may recognize “trestle eight” from the song “Grim”). “It’s a sad ass state of affairs.”

Cleaver, along with Wussy bandmates Lisa Walker and Mark Messerly, will be combining forces for a solo tour throughout the East Coast, New England and the Midwest in Summer 2019. The in-the-round style shows will feature material from Send Aid, as well as from Walker’s and Messerly’s recently-released solo albums (under the monikers The Magic Words and INERT, respectively). The trio will perform in a combination of one-, two- and three-person setups, sharing stories behind the songs as time permits. Some stripped-down Wussy numbers will be included in the set (a la Funeral Dress II and Public Domain), interspersed with new solo and duo material.

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Lisa Walker sings the majority of my more recent favourite Wussy songs, but I will still get hold of this soon.

I saw the three of them doing their solo stuff as support for Wussy when they played Glasgow last year. It was kind of shambolic at times but still very charming.
Hopefully the Chuck Cleaver record will be easier to get hold of than the Magic Words tape release or the INERT CD. I only managed to get the tape from the merch stand at the gig. I still don't have the INERT release.

The Chuck Cleaver record is out and it sounds excellent on first listen. It's his catchiest batch of songs since Attica. The production is just OK but his guitar and vocals are always so strong.

Agree. (Only took me eight months to buy it.) I love "Flowers & the Devil": "I'm so happy that I found you/I can't stand to be around you" is a great line.

I've never watched one of these, but Lisa and Chuck are doing a live Facebook thing right now.

http://www.facebook.com/wussymusic/videos/218542789408976/?v=218542789408976¬if_id=1586559423577212¬if_t=live_video

Some sad news. Our bandmate John Erhardt passed away this week. We are devastated, and we will miss him every day. It was truly such a pleasure to know him. The band’s full statement is below. pic.twitter.com/Po8OxhtEa7

— Wussy (@wussymusic) May 7, 2020

Just came to post that...They're my favourite band, but honestly, I don't know anybody except for Chuck and Lisa.

Same here essentially. RIP, John.

We're taking a week off from the Friday evening live stream but we'll be back next week. Didn't know this was a regular thing, glad they're continuing with it. RIP & rock on.

He was the guitarist of the Ass Ponys as well, he wrote all their best songs ("Mr. Superlove", "11:11", et. al.)

John recorded & mixed & produced the first four Ass Ponys records (as well as a bunch of the Wussy records):

John Erhardt @wussymusic approached the world with a beautiful mixture of curiosity, patience and joy; a creative wildcard that always made the hand stronger. I will treasure the laughs and music. Extra sad to lose someone like this because there are too few of them as it is. pic.twitter.com/pJQQzmI1Th

— John Curley (@MrJohnCurley) May 9, 2020

My favourite Ass Ponys song (couldn't really name an album) is "Astronaut" from--greatest album title ever--Some Stupid with a Flare Gun. Looks like he'd moved on by that point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UU0b_MO_HM

There was a great homemade video for that 10 years ago that appears to have been removed. Gotta remember to record these things before they disappear.

Still there! Forgot that someone took the trouble to hide it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUKZzCodSnA

Damnably has put together an online benefit w/concert footage from our May 2016 show at the Brixton Windmill. They're hosting a watch party today at 1pm PDT / 4pm EDT / 9pm BST. It’s a free online event, but donations to the funds listed in the YouTube link are welcome. ❤️ https://t.co/RzP6ejw3Ib

— Wussy (@wussymusic) May 11, 2020

Ghosts is quite good. My two favourites are "Days and Hours" and "She's Out There." There's a nice of cover Dusty Springfield's "Breakfast in Bed." And it's free!

http://wussy.bandcamp.com/album/ghosts

What's the deal with Friday livestreams?

Are they doing some kind of Vulgar Boatmen split band thing?

Doing a Badfinger cover right now

I watched most of the first one months ago. I'm just not someone to stick with something like that--hope they're making some money out of it.

I hear you. I was watching some of those things regularly but ultimately ended up feeling weird about it somehow.

Just in general, my boundless love for mankind in the first couple of weeks of the pandemic has gradually returned to me telling loud people to shut the fuck up under my breath and getting impatient in slow-moving lines.

I hear you

Got all excited when I found the Wussy/Paranoid Style record for $13 on Amazon, with free shipping, so I ordered it immediately. I had it in my wind it was a double-EP. It's a 12-inch single...I just paid $13 for a 12-inch single, quite probably the least frugal thing I've done in 45 years of buying records.

"in my mind"...a little extra proof it may be going.

Well maybe it'll be good---let us know. Paranoid Style vocals put me off, but I didn't stay with it long, whenever that was.
Forgot to paste this, from What Are You Listening To?:
Wussy's Ghosts is/are odds and sods, appropriately for The Who influence that keeps coming back, even on campfire and laundromat songs here (guitars tend to push back against and through woolgathering words, some the vocal levels take getting used to, but yknow studio field recordings, with some odd little ambient sounds---Lisa Gardner's voice always comes right out, even on one of her damn Magic Numbers Radio Shack tracks, where she comes out just enough to pull me in, or close enough to see her slow spin, in the dryer, like.

She also rolls one of the most startling highlights among several: a cover of the Eddie Hinton-Donnie Fritts classy chestnut "Breakfast in Bed," a highlight of the all-highlights Dusty In Memphis,here with guitars from another part of theeeee 60s.
you can listen to the whole thing here:
https://wussy.bandcamp.com/album/ghosts
Although the tracks are in a different order in the promo file; play 'em as you please, of course. Quite few releases on their bandcamp.

in lieu of a poll i hereby request lists of top wussy songs from clemenza and others

no doubt i'm the only one hung up on 'donny's death scene'

Love to! Here's the 80-minute CD I play in the car (goes up to What Heaven Is Like...I don't think they've released anything since).

1. airborne (2005)
2. crooked (2005)
3. bought it again (2005)
4. millie christine (2007)
5. tiny spiders (2007)
6. sun giant says hey (2007)
7. melody ranch (2007)
8. vivian girls (2007)
9. gone missing (2009)
10. all the bugs are growing (2009)
11. pizza king (2011)
12. little miami (2011)
13. teenage wasteland (2014)
14. halloween (2014)
15. home (2014)
16. beautiful (2014)
17. dropping houses (2016)
18. aliens in our midst (2016)
19. skip (2018)
20. black hole (2018)

Kornrulez6969 suggested above that I should have included "Rigor Mortis," and I think that is indeed a fan favourite--I like it, not quite as much as what I have.

nice, ty!

Hello friends!
We wanted to let you know that the Wussy Duo (Chuck and Lisa) will be teaming up with Undertow Shows for a fall living room tour. There are still a few tickets left in Cleveland, Buffalo, Montpelier, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh.
Tickets are available here: undertowshows.com/collections/wussy

Here's the full list of dates:
Oct 28 - Cincinnati (Sold Out)
Oct 29 - Cleveland
Oct 30 - Buffalo
Nov 1 - Montpelier
Nov 2 - Brooklyn (Sold Out)
Nov 3 - Philadelphia
Nov 4 - Baltimore (Sold Out)
Nov 5 - Pittsburgh
Nov 6 - Columbus (Sold Out)

It's been ages since we've been able to play live, and we're really excited to get back out on the road. We would love to see you there!
xo
Lisa & Chuck

Or that I was (guessing they don't mean Columbus GA or MS)

New album coming too.

oh sweet, thanks for the tip dow, hadnt heard about this, will definitely be scooping a ticket

I found Ghosts in the glove compartment the other day, the last thing they released (COVID year). Looking it up later led me to something I didn't know: Mark Messerly, their bassist, put out an album in 2019 under the name Inert. So I bought it from Bandcamp and, as I expected, if you're a Wussy fan it's quite good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTOCaqgjo5Y