For Wet Leg, artifice and the unknown inspire their authenticity—though watching horror films together in between collaborative writing sessions didn’t hurt, either. Behind the uncanny, creepy, Cronenberg-esque visuals, however, is a record that feels open-hearted and vulnerable. The band’s love songs are freaky and full-bodied, blissful and bedlam, gross and engrossing. “Jennifer’s Body” is a song about obsessive, all-consuming love—the Megan Fox-starring film’s queer subtext now looms larger for Teasdale. The aching “Davina McCall”—named after the British TV presenter and pop-culture treasure—is about the beautiful banality of relationships. (McCall, for the record, is a certified Wet Lag fan, and was delighted to be namechecked.) “Pillow Talk” is very, very horny, and “Liquidize” gets gooey about a lover with more confronting, wacky lyricism. “So many creatures in the fucking world, how could I be your one? Be your marshmallow worm?” Teasdale sings, her vocals oscillating from almost baritone booms to a sinewy falsetto and a vicious spitfire.
While Teasdale has been invigorated by finding her queerness in tandem with the record, Chambers writes her own love songs about fellow bandmate and partner Mobaraki—one is from his perspective, addressed to her.
I catch Teasdale in the days after Glastonbury; she managed to stay for a few days and catch friends and peers like Katy J. Pearson play. “We barely ever really get to stay at festivals anymore, and we’ve got four this week,” she says. “You forget what it’s like to be in the crowd. I think it’s really important to go and get stuck in.”
Touring again has “breathed fresh air into the first album,” she adds. “And people are already so supportive of the new stuff—I love seeing them already knowing the lyrics, or people that don’t just, like, making the vowel sounds to sing along with us.”
Teasdale is trying to take stock where she can. “The first record was such a shock. And this is…our first time making a second record,” she says with a laugh. “I kept thinking, Has our luck run out? Will people still care? We built up so much from the first album, it’s been nerve-racking. But I’ve felt the love.”
Below, Rhian Teasdale chats Moisturizermaking love songs, and pissing off men.
