A ghostly elegant expression of sorrow, self-doubt, and searching, Loose Wing’s “Beverly” will leave you hollowed out and humbled.
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You don’t need to have had your mid-life crisis in order to empathize with Loose Wing’s emotionally turbulent new song. Few folks really know who they are, what they’re doing, and where they’re going – and those who say they do are lying. We’re all trying to make things work as we go down our own respective paths, justifying each step we take along the way. Life is an imperfect system, but it’s far easier to say or type those words than to actually internalize them. Loose Wing’s “Beverly” brings to life the vivid pain of such anxiety and loss of self, using the lens of a fraught relationship to explore the deeper emotions and mechanics at play.
So you think you want to be a day drinker
No, no, I just want to un-become
So I guess you want to self destruct then huh?
Oh, no I’m just drowning in the dust
Well maybe you ought to try being simple
I tried, I tried ‘til it broke my heart
Stream: “Beverly” – Loose Wing
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/562934352?secret_token=s-ybv1B” params=”color=%23522416&auto_play=true&visual=true&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”300″ iframe=”true” /]Atwood Magazine is proud to be premiering “Beverly,” Loose Wing’s first release of 2019 and the lead single off their self-titled debut album (out March 22, 2019). The Seattle-based four piece of Claire Tucker (guitars, vocals, keys), Jack Peters (bass), Rusty Willoughby (drums, percussion), and Bill Patton (guitar, pedal steel), Loose Wing are an experimental indie rock / indie pop band with a light, grungey twist. Steeped in a flurry of melancholia, “Beverly” is a fitting introduction to Loose Wing’s sound and style, highlighting their tendency toward mellow sings with a heavier weight.
Oh, Beverly
why are your paintings always so lurid?
You bore me to death with it all
Oh, Beverly
your tiny voice like nails to a blackboard
Oh here come the waterworks
“It’s an account of a fictional 1950’s marriage, told as a dialogue between a controlling husband and a stifled, self-medicating wife. But it’s also a reflection of my internal dialogue, between the side of me that needs to make art to stay sane and the side that tries to push all that aside and be a responsible adult,” Claire Tucker says of this track. “The song opens with a confidently unadorned backbeat and a bass line reminiscent of ‘Alien Lanes’-era Guided By Voices, followed by a plainspoken tremolo-inflected baritone guitar line. Dialogue begins between a disapproving husband and wife struggling to stay above water, adhering to a loosely alternating pattern line-by-line throughout the verses.”
According to Tucker, “Beverly” blurs the line between fiction and reality in its depiction of inner conflict and its external manifestations in everyday life.
“I visualize this kind of ‘Revolutionary Road’-type couple having these fraught conversations over several bourbons. However there is some element of embellished autobiography involved. Jack (Peters, bass) and I (guitar/vocals) are a married couple with two kids. We were in the early stages of a difficult period when I wrote this song. I had quit a web development job, wanting to spend more time with our kids and have a chance to work on music and figure out what to do next, leaving Jack as the sole breadwinner. It was a very difficult adjustment both financially and relationally for us and created an uncomfortable power dynamic in the relationship. So some of the story of ‘Beverly’ was based on my feelings of struggling to pull my weight, but also be true to myself and my own desires.”
“But this is really more of an internal battle for me. Even though I just turned 40, I still struggle with being an adult. Or maybe I just don’t fully believe in some of the rules around what adulthood means in our culture, that you just need to buckle down and work hard even if it comes at the expense of taking care of yourself, spending time with loved ones and doing things that bring joy. And that’s just supposed to be how life works.”
Oh doctor she’s not the girl I married
Can’t you give her just a little shock?
Something to smooth out this hysteria
Shake shake the old sunshine up
So you think you’re gonna run out on me now
But I’ll never let you leave
Loose Wing paint a musical spiral of despair, sucking joy from the air as “Beverly” dwells in a dark place of hopeless despondency. The song very much feels like Tucker’s own hearty lament, and perhaps indeed it might best be appreciated that way. The Beverly character represents so many of us who are lost on our own little dingy, floating in an ocean with no land in sight.
What on the surface feels like a dispute between two people, is really a dispute between one.
Says Tucker:
This is a massive understatement but creative pursuits are not taken seriously unless you figure out how to monetize them. Which is next to impossible, so I’m trying to decide if I am the kind of person who can be scrappy and just work enough to carve out a minimalist living with the bulk of my time spent on music, or if I’m the type who can just let music be an evening and weekend hobby. These are definitely unresolved issues and I feel like I’ve been in some form of crisis for several years, and I’m not sure I’ll ever figure this stuff out.
So yeah, I feel like the lyrics to ‘Beverly’ are less a depiction of our actual marriage than a metaphorical portrait of my own internal conflict. I’ve lived with some form of depression pretty much my entire adult life. I tend to be pretty dark and pessimistic and my outlook is basically that day-to-day life is full of stomach flus and broken-down cars and unforeseen expenses, but the bright side of this outlook is that most of that stuff doesn’t surprise me when it happens, and anyway I still lead a pretty privileged existence if those are the worst types of problems I deal with most days.
I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s really important to build up my own little supply of beauty in the form of music, friendships, even just little things like sleep or a hot shower. I’m not really a spiritual person, this is just about figuring out what it takes to milk some joy out of existence for myself and my loved ones and make sure I notice when the joy happens. This can be very challenging for someone with depression and anxiety, and it requires tuning out a lot of negativity in terms of the news, social media, and just trying not to take on the full weight of everyone else’s struggles.
I am trying to be very conscious about it. So this might be a stretch but I’ve got to tie it back in to the song somehow… So maybe the more uplifting chord progression and string arrangements at the end of ‘Beverly’ are a reflection of that outlook somewhat, once you get past the darkness and the relational claustrophobia, there is still hope for some kind of transformation or joy.
A ghostly elegant expression of sorrow, self-doubt, and searching, “Beverly” will leave you hollowed out and humbled. Stream Loose Wing’s new song exclusively on Atwood Magazine!
Stream: “Beverly” – Loose Wing
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? © Doug Arney
