Do It Quick And Make Me Pretty: A Song-by-Song Analysis of Willy Rodriguez’s Silly Love Songs for Unfortunate Breakups
Talking with the jangle-pop two-piece Willy Rodriguez after finishing my first full listen to their newest album yielded a conversation very similar to the work itself: eclectic, ever-changing but constantly exciting and captivating. The two members, Willy Rodriguez himself (lyrics, main vocals, guitar) and Star Starer (production, keyboards, background vocals, bass, drums, and a lot more), met in a more unconventional way than most. “Star used to have an old YouTube channel, and we met through there, and I saw his music because he always talked about it and would stream it on servers, and I thought he was really talented,” Willy recalls. “He still is really talented, and that’s why I really wanted to work with him. I am very grateful, because without him, I don’t think I’d be anywhere.” The pair originally worked collaboratively, but chose to keep their works separate. “I wanted to credit Star, because he does most of the work, and I want people to know that,” Willy said of the separate listings. “So that’s why I mainly credited him for the longest time.” Star, however, asked Willy to remove his name from future songs as a separate credit, instead combining his work with Willy’s to create the band as it is today. “I wanted it to be seen as a band instead,” says Star.
Working completely virtually, the band relies on voice calls to create their music together in live time. “What usually happened was, [Star] would make an instrumental, and while he was making an instrumental, I’d write along with the song, which is not a good way to write,” Willy says. “So what we do now is we both sit in a call, and he makes the instrumental, and we both listen to it, and we try to map out what we sort of want in a song, so we want to go through a normal pop structure, or we want it to be more complex. And after that, I sort of go off and write my own lyrics and record it.”
The duo credit The Smiths, above all other influences, for the majority of their inspiration in instrumental work. “I literally don’t listen to anything else but The Smiths,” claims Star. “We’ve been compared to Weatherday and The Smiths, so I think that’s the best descriptor of us.”
The art, like the music, is a collaborative effort between the two artists. Willy draws the multifarious characters, while Star chooses color palettes and brings vibrance to them. They each have their own influences as well: Willy credits the fashion in the movie Trainspotting for the outfits of his characters, which Star draws inspiration from Japanese artists of the 70s and 80s. As I was (very passionately) informed by Willy, the fox-like characters have absolutely no relation to those of indie rock band Car Seat Headrest, despite the similarity. “I made the drawing when I was twelve,” Willy stresses. “I didn’t even know what Car Seat Headrest was.” The band emphasized the necessity of spontaneity within their work: “I think that the sort of art of it comes out better when you don’t think about it too much and you just write it down,” Willy states. This spur-of-the-moment technique for planning could possibly be credited for the wide variety of themes, styles, and genres found within the album - no single song could be described in quite the same way.
Throughout the process of listening to this album thoroughly, I can guarantee this is the song I have listened to the most, making it the perfect, addictive starter track. It begins with an infectiously catchy guitar line in a similar vein to the work of Her’s, before being joined by punchy, energetic drums to give the track a more punkish feel. Willy switches between singing and shouting the lyrics, which describe a double-entendre situation where the subject could be seen as experiencing a live cremation, or just trapped sitting inside during a typical Midwestern summer. “Power Walker, despite its name, isn’t about powerwalking, we just liked the name,” Willy says. “It was mainly about cremation, but I wanted it to be sort of metaphorical, so I tried to make it open to interpretation if the main person in the song is trapped inside their house on a summer day having a boring time, or someone accidentally being cremated.”
Though this track has a similar feel to the previous, it begins to explore what will soon become a common theme throughout the album - that of the identity dilemma and the incessant feeling of a need to define oneself. It’s not uncommon to hear identity talked about in music, but Willy manages to write about these issues with an impressive sense of universality and worldliness, writing, “What shape will I be next / What dress will I be put in tonight?” While the beginning of the song is in a punchy 4/4, it makes a switch to a slower waltz tempo, layering in many different melody lines and voices. Reminiscent of a rock opera, the song slowly crescendoes before reverting back to the original tempo and rhythm, this time continuing the established melody lines intermingling with one another. These rich, chamber-pop-like vocal harmonies also make a return multiple times throughout the album, becoming an impressive hallmark of the band’s sound.
In an abrupt, yet pleasant stylistic change from Doll House, Drug Bug begins with an 80s-esque drum machine, with the appropriate synth sound following suit. The track’s instrumental as a whole, but especially within the intro, could have easily belonged to any song by XTC or Duran Duran, complete with plenty of cowbell. (This new-wave nuance is something the band openly emphasizes - within the credits of the album, a special thanks is given to Wham!). With this track, Willy and Star continue the trend of complex and layered harmonies, this time with a singular melody line backed up by many lines of background vocals.
Valentine Homicide has a more unadulterated sound than that of the preceding tracks, with a limited amount of background vocals to emphasize focus on the comprehensive melody line. With a twinkly, acoustic guitar-heavy sound, the song is strongly reminiscent of Elliott Smith, whom the band credits as one of their inspirations. The track also clocks in at just over a minute, making it the shortest song on the album thus far, more of a prelude or intermission. The lyrics highlight another large facet of the album: its emphasis on lost love and defective relationships. Willy sings in mourning of past relationships, written here as “valentines,” and how “the papercuts they give / aren’t worth the tribulations.” The song is both a blend of and a juxtaposition between the subjects of love and violence, mixing imagery of blood and slashing with that of red-pink glitter. Its melancholy sound exerts a mix of anger and acceptance, ending simply with the lyrics, “when is said and all has done / you’ll never hear this shitty song.”
When comparing the music to the vocals and lyrics in this track, Love Liquor can most accurately be described as an enigma of the best kind. The song maintains a strongly uptempo waltz, akin to that of any number of 40s jazz standards. The lyrics, however, keeping in theme with previous track Valentine Homicide, evoke strong themes of a toxic and crippled relationship. In this instance, Willy sings about mental issues getting in the way of what should be a happy connection, saying that “it’s all in the way / whenever I hug you.” This track contains some of the most passionately sung lines in the album, although the entirety of this project is incredibly ardent and personal. (It also contains some…alternate meanings to the title and lyrics, if you’re brave enough to let your mind go there.)
In another surprising, yet refreshing stylistic twist, La Romanza begins with a keyboard-led bossa nova beat, before being joined by vocals: first in English, sung by Star, then in unison Spanish - mispronounced intentionally, the duo proclaims. “We originally wrote the song with the correct translation, but we wanted it to flow better, so we made it sound like complete gibberish in Spanish in order to make it sound better,” says Willy. This approach, as Willy states, works in the song’s favor - it completes the gaudy, classic sound of Latin romance standards. As the track progresses, however, the sound transitions into the more usual jangle-pop sound of the group. The lyrics reflect this, beginning as a simple profession of love before slowly moving into anger and hatred, with the subject venting their frustration over their lover’s supposed disinterest and ignorance.
Similar to Power Walker, Yr Biggest Fan begins with a barebones, earworm-y guitar line, before being joined by powerful, pop-punkish drums. Coming out of a slew of tracks on romance, it focuses more on the previously mentioned topic of identity issues - specifically how devoted fans of influential cultural figureheads tend to obsess over emulating their exact identity, often to a point of complete delusion or harm (“the words you say won’t fit my mouth / so I’ll cut it wide and try to shout”). According to Willy, “I think with a lot of people who are very obsessed with musicians or just celebrities in general, I think they sort of want to be them, and they make their personality into that person. I think they sort of want to replace them, and that’s sort of what the lyrics meant.” The song crescendoes into screaming vocals and louder, faster drums, before culminating in a surprisingly soft, harmony-rich close, once again showing off the duo’s impressive, complex vocal arrangements.
If there were a single song on this album which best represented the noise-pop sound Willy Rodriguez is known for, it would be this one. Though slightly slower than some of the more punk-influenced songs, the track still contains the band’s trademark guitar tone and accompanying splashy drums. Lyrically, the track focuses on the storied teenage archetype of aimlessly drifting skater kids who spend lackluster days indulging in drugs and sex (hence the title, Skateboard Cretins). This commonality of teen boredom, especially in suburbia, was a large motivator for Willy within the writing of the album as a whole. “I sort of had this idea for another album while writing songs for this one, of different experiences in the Midwest area, because there’s not a lot to do in the Midwest,” says Willy. “So I think I wrote from that.” Another apparent theme within the song is that of neglectful parent figures, with the lyrics stating, “I know you think it’s no surprise / but your baby boy wants to die.”
This simple, roughly-thirty-second interlude is actually the single collaboration with other artists on the album: carter c, indie pop artist and owner of Willy Rodriguez’s record label, friend’s house, and Gustavo Nome, frontman of friend’s house band Monkey and the Permavirgins. The track, unlike every other on the album, is a simple profession of love, unburdened by any other influences, and contains classic romantic harmonies and guitar strums to match. The song was a successful shot on Star’s part to experiment with a new sound: “Star really wanted to make a barbershop quartet for the longest time, ever since the first album, but we didn’t do it, but since we had different people on friend’s house, we asked Carter and Gustavo to feature on the song with us for a barbershop quartet,” says Willy.
Calling back to the softer influences of Valentine Homicide, Breezeblock Trainstop begins with a simple acoustic guitar before quickly transitioning into an explosive chorus. If one were to interpret Silly Love Songs for Unfortunate Breakups as a story, Breezeblock would be the conclusion - a close on the mishaps and problems of the central character, and the only song written partially from an outside perspective. As the song states, “It’s about a pretty boy / who never knew his name / he hid inside his room / and clipped off his angel wings.” The identity issues which have continued to show themselves throughout the album are once again highlighted here, as well as the themes of troubled, meaningless relationships (“you kiss him on the mouth / but it didn’t mean a thing”).
A favorite of many fans, the song is also a sonic triumph in the band’s opinion. “I think it’s really cool when we play around with different genres, and that’s kind of what Breezeblock Trainstop was,” says Willy. The track ends the album on a more melancholy note, with the subject claiming to have given up. Ending the song with an abrupt cutoff - as opposed to other songs fading out or having a definite conclusion - could allude to the “story” not quite being over for the subject yet, despite their claims.
To cover every topic and genre covered within Willy Rodriguez’s Silly Love Songs for Unfortunate Breakups, a lot more writing than this would be necessary. The best way to truly become familiar, though, is to listen to the album for yourself - it’ll be a different experience for everyone, with varying degrees and aspects of relatability and emotions. The intimacy of the lyrics on every track help to create a special connection with each listener, making Willy Rodriguez a very personal project not only for the creators, but for the fanbase as well. As I continued to listen and relisten to this album, I found myself returning to songs over and over again, eventually putting on the full album while running errands and working. I can confidently say that not a single track on this album is unenjoyable, and a great majority of them very easily become earworms after just one listen. After releasing a full album, though, the two-piece isn’t resting yet - a city-pop inspired album is alleged to be in the works, as well as potential upcoming shows with other members of the friend’s house record label. No matter what Willy Rodriguez decides to create next, their extensive reach over genres and fans will ensure them success in any endeavor.
(Star was at a PetSmart while this interview was being conducted.
Per the artist’s stylistic choice, both carter c and friend’s house records are not meant to be capitalized.)
Stella Garner, also known by pen name stella marie, is a 17-year-old writer and poet from Las Vegas, Nevada. Her articles and work focus on music and media analysis, editorials, news, and more. She also has an extensive range of poetry and collages featured on her Instragram, @dostoevskyfanclub. Find more information at stellamariewrites.carrd.co.
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