The Ladybug Transistor

Can't Wait Another Day

Merge

originally published September 26, 2007

Once, while watching The Ladybug Transistor play, a female companion said something to the effect of "if you're going to fall into the cliché of being a female bassist in an otherwise all-boy band, you better at least be good." Similarly, in the liner notes to Can't Wait Another Day, you can find a picture of a shaggy-haired dude holding a ukulele in front of Brooklyn's Williamsburgh Savings Bank tower, which is the indie-rock equivalent of a middle-aged woman holding a Princess Diana plate in front of fake wood paneling.

But to say something is cliché doesn't necessarily mean that it's bad. You can put on an old disco album today and hear all its overdone elements as glorious and electrifying, either because time allows us to appreciate the sound outside of its historical context or because it was really good all along. Could this happen with our modern indie music? Could, one day, its corduroy comfortability and its affectless pathology sound vital and important? Is the preponderance of its clichés evidence not of laziness but of quality replicating itself organically?

Well, no, at least not for The Ladybug Transistor, which sounds like a nap taken by an eight-year-old in 1974. There's one decent song, "Always on the Telephone," and when I try and remember it when it's not playing, I just think of "Hangin' on the Telephone" instead, which sounds nothing like it, probably. Oh, and that bassist? Still not so good.

Michael Barthel

The Ladybug Transistor is playing at the Caledonia Lounge on Tuesday, Oct. 2.