“Zombie” by Watashi Wa ft. Anberlin, Tuesday, May 24, 2022
On Friday, Watashi Wa released their latest record People Like People on Tooth & Nail Records. Over the past two decades, lead singer Seth Roberts has had three bands: Watashi Wa, Eager Seas, and Lakes, but in a recent episode of As the Story Grows podcast, he said that he feels that he will only make music with Watashi Wa from now on because all of the other monikers were basically the same band as Watashi Wa. Roberts is a collaborating force, so when the latest Watashi Wa record was announced a list of bands in the milieu of Tooth & Nail pop-punk, nostalgic listeners got even more excited about the resurrection of the sound of 2003's The Love of Life.
PISSED OFF AND BLEEDING. While collaboration is one of the strongest selling points of People Like People, Scott Fryberger from JesusFreakHideOut.com in a review of the album called out the band on their overselling the featured artists. Listeners are often hard-pressed to identify the featured artists. The album, though, in some aspects could stand well on its own, without crediting the featured artist directly. People is punk in its often loose instrumentation, but the melody is strong. Roberts's vocals are in tune, but it feels like the music is tuning to his vocals rather than the other way around, which is a feature I noticed in earlier pop punk bands like Weezer and Unwritten Law. When Roberts came back on the Labeled podcast two weeks ago, he revealed that today's song, "Zombie," was written with Stephen Christian and was intended to be an Anberlin song for their upcoming album; however, Anberlin decided to pass on the track as their album was going in another direction. The song features a bridge sung by Stephen Christian. This is more than most of the collaborators get on the album, as longtime fans of the bands strain to hear their obscure favorite punk rock band sing back-up on the track.
WHILE THE BUSINESSES ARE BURNING. If you were still enjoying network TV, say Grey's Anatomy or This Is Us, in 2019 you had to endure a longer hiatus before the beginning of the 2020 season. Then, when the shortened season finally aired, the shows were often re-scripted to address the global pandemic. You realized, you really didn't miss network TV while you were binging Tiger King and Love Is Blind. In many ways that "back to normal, but not normal" sense that you get when watching television made during COVID feels like this album. Many of the themes Roberts and company explore on this record have been ones that we've been thinking about throughout the pandemic, but we've also been battered with them so much from whichever political wing you subscribe to. And speaking of politics, songs like "Zombie," try very hard to push for neutrality. Roberts compares the gloom and doom of the news to the MK-Ultra experiments in the 1950s and '60s. The real culprit, according to the song, is the media, preying on the detached public trapped in their own private Idahos. Other songs like "Land of the Free" use language more associated with right-wing politics. In some moments on People Like People, it's hard to see what Roberts is arguing. At the end of "Zombie," Roberts' daughter, who speaks throughout the record, gives a touching elementary school-style speech about the ideals of equality. She says, "I believe in equality for all and opportunity for all." The rhetoric of this album is about peace and depolarization; however, it seems that the album naively ignores the conflict that exists and that smoothing things over will erase the deeper issues. But this is not to say that there's no merit in a little smoothing.
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