Wolfie
- Awful
Mess Mystery
other Wolfie-related releases
Wolfie
Michael S. Downey-Guitar,
Vocals
R.J Porter-Drums
Amanda A. Lyons-Keyboards, Vocals
Joseph A. Ziemba-Bass, Vocals
Awful Mess Mystery
Lotsa
tambourines. Lotsa maracas. Lotsa new wavey synth. Not what
you’d expect from a
band whose first single was released on Braid’s Grand
Theft Autumn label. No matter. Popsmear gave that
single **** ½ big stars (of course we can’t reprint
that "review").
The kids that made Awful Mess
Mystery look younger than kids. They’re based
in Champaign-Urbana and they tour the same "underground-house-show" tour
circuit that has embraced the punks and indie-rockers.
Somehow WOLFIE fit. Maybe it’s their energy. Maybe
it’s their youth. Maybe it’s Sarge’s desire
to cover a WOLFIE penned song on the new Sarge CD. Maybe
it’s the engineering work of Poster Children/Salaryman
man, Rick Valentin. Maybe it’s because no track on Awful
Mess Mystery quite reaches three minutes.
They’ve been in no previous
bands you know. Until now, they’ve released nothing
but two 7" singles. But, people are starting to repeat
the name WOLFIE. Tell your friends. Say, "stripped down
new-wavey pop rock with male/female vocals." And even
then, it won’t be enough. WOLFIE are definitely greater
than the sum of those parts.
Wolfie press:
MOJO,
June 1998
Wolfie—cute name, kitschy
sound—keep most of their crisp, home-demoed tunes under
two minutes on Awful Mess Mystery (Mud). Lots of chintzy,
mono synth. Depeche Mode gate-crashing a Ramones rehearsal?
It’s much better than it sounds.
The Village
Voice, June 16, 1998
Seven-inch-single-collecting
pop geeks from Champaign-Urbana, they’re still fresh
enough to get over on adenoids and one-finger synth parts
they picked
up from 80s MTV.
Milk,
Number 27
"Wolfie’s debut full-length
reads like a list of influences: Superchunk, the Rentals,
Small Factory, Guided By Voices, and that Dog are all part
of the book. Where that would normally be a big turn-off,
Wolfie succeed by twisting their heroes into a distinguishable
sound of their own creation, with great new-wavey songwriting.
Wolfie are youthful and proud." – Jim Minor
Muddle
"Hey this record is a lot
of fun! Poppy music with a little bit of synth here and there.
Guy vocals with girl backing vocals make a soothing sound.
Very reminiscent of the Rentals. I like this a lot. This
is the flavor that pop music needs." – RR
University
Reporter-Chicago, March 1998
"Wolfie’s
new Awful
Mess Mystery is one of the most fun records to surface
in a few years. The Champaign-Urbana band excels in that
brand of adolescent (in its youthful tone, not its inexperienced
mediocrity) songcraft practiced by bands like Superchunk
and the Promise Ring. The band does nothing less than provide
great driving-around summer music. All the songs kind of
drift together, but when it’s a fucking great song,
who cares? "Mock House" (which sounds like an
outtake from Superchunk’s recent Indoor Living,
if they’d made that record when they were still teenagers)
rocks like nothing else, its analog synth lines, jangly
guitar and splashy drums combining to make you wish you
were still in high school."
3 Syllables
"The
songs on Awful Mess
Mystery average less than two minutes, and the longest
one doesn’t even make it to three. Brevity is a quality
I admire in a pop song, but the downside is that even with
thirteen songs, this album is over before you know it.
But that’s okay, you just play it again. At times
it can get a little moog happy, but that’s forgivable,
what with all those "sha la la la" vocals. And
is that a Casio I hear?" – ET
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