Posted: by The Editor
I could’ve sworn I’ve heard “Love on the Outside” before, maybe on the radio while my mom drove me to school or over the speakers at a roller rink or on a mixed CD one of my siblings made me when they left for college. It sounds like a song that’s been around forever, always in the background of my life, a song that should’ve been written before.
“Love on the Outside” is the first single from Triple Seven, the upcoming debut full-length from Indianapolis indie rockers Wishy. Their two EPs from last year, Mana and Paradise, are both excellent, the sort of sweltering, dreamlike stuff that’s en vogue lately; Wishy distinguish themselves from many of their peers in that lane with the interplay between vocalists Nina Pitchkites and Kevin Krauter, whose voices tend to melt together when they harmonize to help the hooks pop in a way rarely seen in this style. (See Paradise highlight “Spinning.”)
But even for them, “Love on the Outside” is different. “Love on the Outside” is bigger. From the bouncy opening riff, Wishy sounds more dialed-in, more confident, and as Krauter coos through verses the song picks up momentum like a snowball until the chorus crashes in, sunny and so natural you feel like you’ve always known it. It sounds like a radio dial stuck between The Sundays and Gin Blossoms (or, in the parlance of the average reader of this blog, it sounds like a washed-out take on a basking in the glow deep cut).
Krauter has said that “Love on the Outside” “is about that exciting yet frustrating early phase of a romance when there is uncertainty about where things will go. The scales could tip in either direction and often patience starts to wear thin…. It was fun to bring that kind of melodramatic energy into a song.” Despite that, there’s no anger in this song. Its chorus–”Are you down? Are you free? / Are you listening to me at all?“–isn’t a snarl of frustration, it’s a sigh of contentment. Krauter sounds positively ecstatic, like the answer to every single one of those questions is a self-evident yes.
I saw Wishy last night (with Dazy and Narrow Head), and they were great. They played “Love on the Outside,” and it got a crazy crowd reaction, maybe the biggest of the night. I was enraptured. So was everyone else in the room. They all seemed to feel like they’ve loved that song their whole lives, too.
Triple Seven is out August 16th on Winspear.
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Zac Djamoos | @gr8whitebison
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