WORK WIFE
The old nine to five is where everything’s burning and looks don’t matter. The layers it takes to be comfortable there will make you feel like a sumo wrestler at an after prom event in a dark shopping mall. It’s people who are the full time jobs, not the work itself. You will hear, in great detail, stories of ailments and vet visits of family members and pets you never have and never will know.
Somehow, someone will rope you into a long conversation about how they have to figure out a way to winterize their pool. Between their kids’ hectic schedules and a couples baby shower, they’re going to need a miracle before the weather turns. Brooklyn band, Work Wife, lives in this beautifully recognizable landscape of the dressed up letdown of too much autobiography. It lives in the lament, in the clutter of solitude and distractions, where boredom melts you down the most. The hive is a magnet that cannot be denied and suddenly there you are in the sick ward, providing hospice care for those who aren’t in decline, who aren’t going anywhere, who simply wish to feel a connection of any kind.
Lead singer Meredith Lampe sings, “I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m here for you,” on the song “Too Young To Understand,” and it comes across as a sweetness that’s oh so exhausted, but genuine. It suggests a sense of “where else would I be” and “we’re going to get through this together, wait and see.” Along with drummer Cody Edgerly and bassist Kenny Monroe, this trio makes the heaviness of the humdrum whirls that we all find ourselves in with each other feel like the grease that binds us. We are milers in this delicate balance that claims to love us back.
- Sean Moeller; Founder of Raccoon Motel, Daytrotter
Filmed at Fox Den Motel
in Dubuque, IA
Directed by:
Jeremy Quentin
Filmed by:
John Woerdehoff
Nick Riedman
Jeremy Quentin
Recorded by:
Laird Scott
Forward by:
Sean Moeller
Special thanks to:
Natalie Gassman
John McDermott