“He don’t get puss he get the boot,” sneers Rhian Teasdale on “Catch These Fists”, the lead single from Wet Leg’s marvellously muscular second album: Moisturizer. Over a beat that springs wonkily - like a three-legged gazelle on a post-punk treadmill – from rubberised bass and a sour candy guitar riff, the frontwoman drawls, snarls and roars as she brushes off a guy bothering her on a night out. “Man down! Ya! Ya!” is how she celebrates his retreat, as the sound fills out around her like the roar of a moshpit.
With writing credits now shared among all five band members, the indie-punk-pop band are still driving their songs with the kind of catchy gonzo hooks that distinguished their 2021 breakthrough “Chaise Longue” (and 2022's double Grammy-winning self-titled debut album). But now they all come at you with a little more consistent, confrontational welly. Founding members Teasdale (who plays rhythm guitar) and Hester Chambers (lead guitar) – who met as teenagers growing up on the Isle of Wight – holed up with male bandmates Henry Holmes, Josh Mobaraki and Ellis Durand at an Airbnb on the Suffolk coast to write the record.
