these records explore the trifecta of male gaze manipulation, dissecting the patriarchy from the vantage points of the...
In Fake Songs about My Future Wife, WifeLord examined male infatuation through the lens of 'The Idealist™'… the Times called it "masterful satire," while JK Rowling noted: "I haven't seen something like this Queen Mary VII." The record originally came out in 1977 to lukewarm sales but has become a mainstay and major influence for bedroom popppers worldwide. Reflecting on the record's longevity, Bandleader and singer Wip Lorpley writes: "There was this girl in a photography class I took. Her name was ________ _______. She was beautiful. I will always love her, and the one time we spent 10 minutes talking, as our film did whatever it does in the liquid stuff in those canisters in that little room––shake shake, pour pour, whatever––that was the best moment of my life. Never gorget. This one for you, firl. That's just something I like to do sometimes [laughs]: take the first letter of one word and then flip-flop it with another word … What was the question again? Oh yeah, ________ _______… hot damn, what a piece. I was truly transformed in that darkroom. You could say I saw the light, sure. Too bad you can't make your dreams come true by changing how the light looks." | Three years later, during the winter of 1980, WifeLord would shock the world with their brutal, skewering, offensive, and wonderful release: Lovefucker, and its controversial character and subject matter: The Misogynist™. The album led to their being banned in 37 states and 14 countries worldwide. Looking back on the fuss, Wip Lorpley can only sigh, shrug and offer a non-response that totally sidesteps the issue: "I just know this came out on Valentine's Day many years ago, and it upset A LOT of folks. But… Lovefucker, to me, is just 'bad relationship computer pop' [laughs]. That's a fake genre, I know. Specifically, it's sorta about that splendid feeling of murderous jealously that isn't real? Ya know? I'm not sure. I just wanted to set something to the dulcet tunes of that midi-synth and add a bunch of bad, kooky vocal effects. Etc, etc. I'm not Picasso. Hell, I'm not even Bob Ross. But, yeah… I try. I tried. I tried to do something and it backfired. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to say. It's fiction. It's just as much a piece of satire than the last one, and that got rave reviews. It did… it really hurt." | In the aftermath of their last record, Wip Lorpley put the WifeLord project on ice… for a decade. When they emerged, in the spring of 1990 he was a changed man, with a changed band. My Life the Daydream marked a departure as much as it did a return: The Misogynist was dead. And born onto the world… The Fatalist™. Tommy York of Radio Head called the album, "a signifier, a landmark… if not the decade's best than surely its most influential." For what it's worth, Wip called the LP: "This is just an album, ya know? Sure, 'secretly', it is the third in a trilogy that is 'unofficially' known as the Wife-Love-Life trilogy. I like to think of it as my 'formal response' to Bowie's "Berlin" albums [laughs]. No. These records all have 13 songs each on them. I know that. This is the longest of the trio, too. It's also a semi-autobiographical and semi-conceptual song cycle about a homicidal/suicidal drunk named Bob, my avatar, or something… I was going through some stuff in the 80s. Anyway, it's definitely more 'conceptual' than the other two. Also, I think this is the first album in awhile to not use any parentheses in the song-titling. So that's something." |
hey y'all, jeff here... i'm proud to be able to release these records here in the 21st century on The Pizza Puppies brand/record label. they are a complicated set, for sure, but their value i.m.o. cannot be denied. i am also pleased to annouce that they're the first records on p.p./myamerica to feature on streaming platforms and mainstream digital stores. see the links above for each album on spotify, itunes, amazon and google play. i truly believe this is a landmark release in our discography and i want to personally thank the lorpley estate for granting us access and publishing rights.
and lastly, i want to thank wip lorpley himself. everyone knows that he was wifelord. the interviews i conducted just before his death will forever remain among my fondest memories. goodnight, sweet prince.
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