To use de rigeur lingo, Wet Leg understand the assignment.
Rock music, at its most distilled, boils down to attitude, essentially embracing the intricacies and eccentricities of life with knowing, studied wryness. This disposition succinctly illustrates the gist of Wet Leg’s music, first launched with fervor via 2021’s Grammy-winning “Chaise Lounge,” carrying over with aplomb to “CPR,” the strutty, sinewy lead single from the group’s excellent sophomore set Moisturizer.
“Is it love or suicide?” vocalist-guitarist Rhian Teasdale intones in the track’s pre-chorus, simultaneously evoking the dry, wry syncopated coolness of PJ Harvey. But unlike Harvey’s proclivity for slow, simmering blues, “CPR” is terse and goes for the jugular with a delectable push-and-pull between kinetic basslines, four-on-the-floor drums and skewed, dissonant guitar riffs.
The quiet-loud dynamic eventually reaches its apex nearly two minutes into its running time with a fake 911 call and its “I’m! In! Love!” proclamation before launching into an ecstatic cornucopia of electric instrumentation and sirens blaring, amped all the way up to their loudest volume. Next thing you know, the song is over and you’re compelled to press play all over again.
How Wet Leg Continues To Shake Up Rock Music
What makes “CPR,” and indeed, the Isle of Wright-hailing outfit’s oeuvre, a cut above the rest is precisely the tension between its minor chords and major feelings as filtered through a distinctly British female lens. It’s calm and collected but also unabashed and sardonic, and in its own way, helps both redefine and revitalize rock music in the poptimist age.
In 2017, New York Times declared that rock was ruled by women; fast forward eight years later, the statement has held up quite well given the likes of Wet Leg, Dry Cleaning, Wolf Alice, and M(h)aol, to name but a few.
Furthermore, Wet Leg punctuate their tried-and-true indie rock formula with a sense of playfulness and humor that makes it highly compelling, even with (or perhaps exactly thanks to) its curtness. Similar to Mitski, Wet Leg revel in the economy of words, encapsulating grand sentiments and moments in traditional meters without once undercutting their intent. “CPR,” for instance, opens with the following:
I tied a rope around my waist / I tend to get lost in your eyes / I took a breath, jumped off the cliff / Because you told me to…
It is tricky to convey the all-consuming chokehold of desire without resorting to verbosity, even more so to make it sound genuinely charming and even invigorating. And yet, “CPR” does exactly that – all in the space of two-something minutes. “With songs, you listen to the lyrics and you know that not all the words and not all the details and not all the exposition have been included—you kind of expect to take leaps of faith,” Lorde once astutely described. With “CPR,” Wet Leg ask us to do exactly just that: taking sonic leaps of faith in their latest emotional shenanigans, exactly as they’re going through it, even as they flat-out inquire, “Is it fun? Is it a vibe?”.
The Value Of A Strong Indie Rock Presence In The Mainstream
In a culture with a penchant for aesthetics but one that also exclusively prizes polite polishedness, it is unlikely for an act like Wet Leg to break through the mainstream and shift numbers the way groups like Hole, Garbage, or Sleater-Kinney did during the alternative rock boom of the 1990s. But it doesn’t — and shouldn’t — matter when the music is this good, this relatable, this irreverent, this thought-provoking, and this life-affirming.
With ample support from iconic indie label Domino, which also includes Noughties-era main characters (Arctic Monkey, Franz Ferdinand) and envelope-pushing solo trailblazers (Julia Holter, Tirzah) in their roster, Wet Leg are in good hands to help reshape and reinvigorate indie rock. Articulating big feelings as tectonic shifts occur socially, politically, economically, and yes, culturally serves as a lifeline more than ever, especially in the age of detachment. Wet Leg are proof that you can still do so while sounding as cool and disaffected as you please.
Moisturizer was released on July 11, 2025 via Domino Recording Company and available for streaming and purchase here. Schedules and tickets for their upcoming US tour are available here.
