At first blush, Wages’s “Gotta” sounds like your average stadium-ready indie anthem: a slow knit of synths climb toward a vague light, gathering in a tighter nap as they approach their goal. But when we get there, we’re not greeted with a searing chorus of whoa-oh-ohs. Instead, we’re quietly delivered by a strangely pastoral picking pattern into a soft, head-resting recovery.
The ensuing four minutes are indeed colored by the bright flash at the song’s beginning, but they remain largely in its shadow. It’s an interesting take, a beautiful and delicately arranged elevation of the now-banal ode to heavy emotion; by bringing it back to the quotidian and everyday, Wages subvert the anthem, which paradoxically makes “Gotta” a more emotionally resonant song.
The single is taken from the band’s forthcoming Glace, which is due out July 29. “I’m a compulsive apologizer, one of those people that says ‘sorry’ after I do almost anything,” singer Nick Byron Campbell says. “‘Gotta’ is a statement to myself (and anyone else who’s interested) about living life honestly and unapologetically, without shame, especially in the face of difficulties of any kind. As a whole, Glace was written during a time of substantial change for all of us in the band, and I think that comes across in a lot of the songs.”
Check it out below.
Glace is out July 29.
