Follow TV Tropes

Following

Music / Wire

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/wire_band_3005.jpg

"I never know which version I'm going to be
I seem to have so many choices open to me"
Wire, "40 Versions"

Wire are a Long Runner Post-Punk band formed in Watford, England in 1976 by Colin Newman (vocals, guitar), Graham Lewis (bass, vocals), Bruce Gilbert (guitar), and Robert "Gotobed" Grey (drums). note 

Wire are best known for their first three albums:

  1. 1977's Pink Flag and specifically its track "12 X U", which, in a roundabout way, pretty much started the entire genre of Hardcore Punk;
  2. 1978's Chairs Missing, a more experimental effort that helped to define Post-Punk with its slower instruments; and
  3. 1979's 154, which developed the themes found on their previous effort with added synthesizers and studio embellishments in a New Wave-ish manner.

Each set the trend that Wire would later become notorious for: Every album a New Sound Album, every tour a showcase of new material, regardless of fan or critic's opinion.

It was this incorrigibility, as well as internal tensions, that lead the band to leave EMI/Harvest in late 1979, then go on hiatus in 1980, each member retreating to various solo projects. Lewis and Gilbert formed Dome (a.k.a. Cupol, Duet Emmo, Gilbert & Lewis...) and experimented with confusing the hell out of everyone whilst wearing awesome hats; Newman, Gotobed and producer Mike Thorne, on the other hand, made eccentric, punk-inflected pop music under Newman's name.

And then, in 1985, without warning, Wire resurfaced, playing sets consisting solely of new material.

From 1986 to 1989, the band released three albums of darkly satirical Synth-Pop, to the chagrin of many of their punk-minded fans and varying critical opinion. Undeterred, the band soldiered on, experimenting with drum machines, early MIDI technology and remixing, their interests culminating in the 1990 releases of The Drill (consisting of numerous, wildly different versions of their '80s Signature Song "Drill") and the much-derided Manscape.

Seeing himself as irrelevant to the band's new sound, Robert Gotobed quit in 1991; in acknowledgement of his departure, the band changed their name to Wir (pronounced either as "wire" or "veer") and released The First Letter, which produced a Black Sheep Hit in the mournful dance number "So and Slow It Grows". The success was short-lived, and Wir dissolved in 1993.

Aside from the occasional remix project and an epic-length performance of "Drill" commemorating Bruce Gilbert's fiftieth birthday in 1996, Wire remained silent until 1999, at which point they reformed for a series of retrospective shows. Soon, they began to perform and release new material again, starting with the release of the Read & Burn EP series and culminating with 2002's Send. The new releases saw a return to the raw ferocity of Pink Flag married to the lyrical and technological advancements of their '80s releases and production influences taken from modern drum 'n' bass and noise rock, and were greeted with massive enthusiasm from fans and critics alike.

In 2003, Bruce Gilbert, grown bored of playing guitar and interested in pursuing his solo work, amicably left the group; Margaret Fiedler McGinnis of Laika was recruited to replace him as touring guitarist. Subsequent albums, such as 2007's Object 47, have been more subdued and widely spaced, though the band's touring schedule remains formidable. For their 2010 tour, McGinnis was replaced by Matt Simms of It Hugs Back, who became a full member of the band for 2013's Change Becomes Us.


Selected discography:

  • Pink Flag (1977 ) — Arguable Trope Makers for Hardcore Punk; contains "12 X U".
  • Chairs Missing (1978) — One of several Trope Codifiers for Post-Punk.
  • 154 (1979) - Darker and more experimental; many of its songs are Ur Examples of Goth Rock.
  • Document & Eyewitness (1981) — Live album, recorded 1979-1980; notoriously difficult.
  • Snakedrill EP (1986) — Begins Wire Mk. II; also, the first appearance of "Drill".
  • The Ideal Copy (1987)
  • A Bell is a Cup... Until It is Struck (1988)
  • It's Beginning To and Back Again a.k.a. IBTABA (1989) — A "live" album consisting mostly of new versions of older songs based on portions of live performances. There are also a couple studio recordings of new material on the album, and one of those songs, "Eardrum Buzz", is the band's most successful single.
  • The Drill (1990) — Multiple remixes (by the band) of "Drill", some bearing no resemblance to the original.
  • Manscape (1990)
  • The First Letter (1991, as Wir) — Without Robert Gotobed; produced "So and Slow It Grows".
  • Read & Burn 01 (2001) — Begins Wire Mk. III.
  • Send (2002)
  • Read & Burn 03 (2004) — First release without Bruce Gilbert.
  • Object 47 (2007)
  • A Red Barked Tree (2011)
  • The Black Session (2012) — Live-in-the-studio album.
  • Change Becomes Us (2013) — Reworked material originally written circa Document & Eyewitness.
  • Wire (2015)
  • Nocturnal Koreans (2016) - Recorded at the same time as Wire.
  • Silver/Lead (2017)
  • Mind Hive (2020)
  • 10:20 (2020) - New recordings of songs that had evolved significantly in live performance or just got cut; half the album was recorded in 2010 and half in 2020.

This band provides examples of:

  • Careful with That Axe: The second half of "99.9".
  • Cover Album:
    • Received a Tribute Album titled Whore, which included contributions from My Bloody Valentine, Lush, Mike Watt, and Skinny Puppy.
    • They were on the receiving end once again with A Houseguest's Wish, an album in which every track is a different band or artist's take on "Outdoor Miner."
    • Similarly, there was Dugga Dugga Dugga, a whole album of other musicians covering/remixing "Drill".
  • Cover Version:
    • Their songs have been covered a lot: "12 X U" by Minor Threat, "Ex Lion Tamer" by Rollins Band, "Strange" by R.E.M., "Heartbeat" by Big Black...
    • Live at the Roxy includes covers of J.J. Cale ("After Midnight") and The Dave Clark Five ("Glad All Over").
  • Distinct Double Album: Well, distinct single album. For 10:20, side A was recorded in 2010 (with musical assistance from Margaret Fiedler), and side B was recorded in 2020 (with just Newman, Lewis, Grey and Simms). Oddly, the two halves sound remarkably cohesive in spite of the decade separating them.
  • Driven to Suicide: "Another The Letter":
    Behind the curtain, in the yellow bulb light
    The letter reads: I took my own life
  • Epic Rocking: While generally known for the reverse (see below), Wire have shown themselves quite capable of writing longer songs and playing out originally shorter ones in a live setting. The longest formal studio track by Wire is "You Hung Your Lights in the Tress / A Craftsman's Touch" from Manscape at 10:03, but the extant recordings of the 1979 live pieces "Crazy About Love" and "A Panamanian Craze?" both exceed fifteen, and there are live versions of "Drill" said to have gone on for as long as half an hour.
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: "Small Electric Piece", an instrumental made of just synth throbs.
  • Fun with Acronyms: IBTABA, or It's Beginning To and Back Again.
  • Goth Rock: Ur-Example with some of the more moody, experimental tracks from 154.
  • Hardcore Punk: Trope Makers with "12 X U" and Pink Flag. Their brevity and aggression were heavily influential to Hardcore Punk bands such as Minor Threat.
  • Incredibly Long Note: The last word in "Reuters".
  • Intercourse with You: "Practice Makes Perfect" has overtones of this, but the tone of the track and some of the odder references imply something much more sinister.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: Even at their poppiest, they still manage to include lyrics like "Please take your knife out of my back" and "One of us will live to rue the day we met each other". They have also written sweet, singalong songs about leaf-eating insects ("Outdoor Miner"), monetary and sexual exploitation in show business ("Ahead"), cartography as an ecstatic experience ("Map Ref. 41°N 93°W"), and... Nothing at all ("The 15th").
  • Madness Mantra:
    • "Pink Flag" ends with an extended sequence of the band screaming "HOW MANY?!" as the tempo continuously speeds up.
    • "Practice Makes Perfect" has "Waiting, waiting, waiting for us... Waiting, waiting, waiting for us...". Colin only repeats it louder and more unhinged each time.
  • Miniscule Rocking: One of the band's early trademarks, particularly with Pink Flag. They never played a song beyond what seemed necessary, thus most songs lasting between 0:30 - 1:30. They started letting them run longer more often with Chairs Missing.
  • New Sound Album: Practically every new one. Chairs Missing expanded Pink Flag's sound to include lengthier songs, synths and moodier soundscapes, 154 dipped into brooding Gothic Post-Punk, Snakedrill EP began the band's Synth-Pop period, Send and the Read & Burn EP's were much Darker and Edgier, bringing in elements of Industrial Music and Noise Rock, Object 47 marked a steady return to the band's 70s Post-Punk sound, culminating in Change Becomes Us being entirely of incomplete music from 79-80.
  • Non-Appearing Title: "Brazil", "106 Beats That", "Mannequin", "French Film (Blurred)", "Men 2nd", "Outdoor Miner" note , "The 15th", "Blessed State" note , "Map Ref. 41°N 93°W", "Indirect Enquiries".
    • Most of these titles relate to the content of the lyrics in some way, but a few are more oblique: "Brazil" refers to the samba-like groove of Gotobed's drum part, "The 15th" was simply the fifteenth song that they recorded at that session, and "106 Beats That" was originally written to be 106 beats long.
  • Pun-Based Title: The "X" in "12 X U" is self-censorship for "fuck" (so "12 X U" = "want to fuck you").
  • Punk Rock: Circa-Pink Flag. The artiest and coldest Punk Rock band to boot.
  • Post-Punk: Trope Codifiers with Chairs Missing and 154, and Pink Flag is an Ur-Example with its cold and angular sound.
  • Rearrange the Song:
    • Send and Send Ultimate include "Nice Streets Above" and "DJ Fuckoff", which both started off as "Drill" remixes but warped enough to be completely unrecognizable. There's also "12 Times U" and "12 Times X", both remixes of "12 X U". And the loud, fast "Artificial Gravity" got rearranged as the gothic dirge "You Can't Leave Now."
    • Change Becomes Us features more conventional arrangements of some of their stranger material from Document and Eyewitness.
    • The majority of 10:20 is new recordings of songs from their 80s synth-pop period, to better reflect how those song had evolved in live performances.
  • Remix Album: The Drill was a whole album of remixes of one song, "Drill", many of them sounding nothing like the original.
  • Self-Titled Album: Their 2015 album.
  • Signs of the End Times: "Reuters":
    "Prices have risen since the government fell
    Casualties increase as the enemy shell
    The climate's unhealthy, flies and rats thrive
    And sooner or later the end will arrive"
  • Sssssnake Talk: Shorta. "A Sherioush of Shnakesh" hash a very shtrange pronounshiashion of the sh shound in "shnake" - even for a shnake. (In fact, "snake" almost sounds like the German word "Schnecke", minus the last "e".)
  • Step Up to the Microphone: Bassist Graham Lewis began singing lead on Chairs Missing ("Sand in my Joints") and has been the secondary vocalist since.
  • Synth-Pop: Their 80's-90's material.
  • What Is This Thing You Call "Love"?: "Feeling Called Love":
    What is this feeling called love?
    What is this crazy thing I can't explain anyhow?
  • Word Purée Title: "12 X U". "Map Ref. 41°N 93°W" is not, though it looks like it at first glance.
  • Word Salad Lyrics: Clarity is not one of the band's goals. Many of their lyrics make more sense if you know the background to them, especially their denser '80s work, but when a band uses references to polymer plastic's effects on the ivory trade as throwaway lines... Well, confusion is to be expected.

Top