“It gets hard to believe in / what you can’t explain
But I’m not running / I’m ready to go”
Words by Jason Lee
Like yacht rock on a Staten Island Ferry budget, Chris Wills’ new single “Ready To Go” has a certain luxe smoothness to it, esp. the easy-breezy vibe of the rock-reggae verses and the Spanish-tinged guitar solo toward the end, but overall it’s a little too stripped down and power-poppy (those handclaps!) to truly qualify as yacht rock nevermind the underlying tension (anathema to the genre!) created by that thumping kick drum and pulsating single-note rhythm guitar with lyrics that’re likewise way too relatable and grounded in reality to qualify which is to say there’s no Kilimanjaro rising like Olympus above the Serengeti to be found on “Ready To Go,” more like the mundanity of moving boxes and the process of pulling up stakes and changing residences…
…tho’ crucially we’re not talkin’ just habitation here but co-habitation which is a whole ‘nother ball of rolling-the-dice-on-domesticity wax, in this case not only moving from LA to NYC—a return move of sorts for Chris seeing as he originally hails from Union City, New Jersey—but setting up a new household with a GF who performs under the name “Revenge Wife”…
…and it’s the song’s chorus that really captures the mix of exhilaration and, again, underlying tension (mostly the former to be fair, and all this “underlying tension” could be a projection on our own part so take it with a grain of salt) one feels in making such literally big moves with a catchy Franz Ferdinand-esque, disco-punk rave-up groove wedded to an almost incredulous lyric (“c’mon c’mon / she said she wants you”) which qualify the song as as a “banger” or a “bop” in our book depending on your choice of nomenclature…
…and then there’s the music video which captures the rhythms and transitions in the music itself to a tee with the two verses accompanied by scenes of packing up to move and then (you guessed it!) moving in, accompanied by subtitles where Chris confesses to a friend “it feels like I’m stepping into the abyss” with each verse culminating in Chris and then Chris & Liz (a.k.a. Revenge Wife) hopping into a Home Depot moving box and getting magically transported just as the chorus hits…
…into a natural Eden of moss-covered rolling hills with not another soul in sight first with Chris alone and then the happy couple frolicking and twirling and picnicking and canoodling with wreckless abandon and a life-flashing-before-your-eyes montage towards the end and here we should probably mention that Liz Nistico (formerly of Holychild) directed the clip just as she does for all of Revenge Wife’s music videos which tend to be quite striking while telling a continuous story between installments…
…speaking of which, not only did Chris & Liz drop the “Ready To Go” single one week ago today, but just today Revenge Wife dropped a new single called “Myth of a Salesman” which’ll soon have it’s own music video and you can bet we’ll be covering it in these pages too so stay tuned and in the meantime we all oughta maybe consider taking a page from Mr. Wills’s book and be willing and unafraid to dive into a new life if and when the opportunity arises or as Chris puts it in the song’s press release, “The less rigid you become with your life’s plan, the more life seems to open up. Especially when you are following love” (awwww!) so take it from a musician who moonlights as a house painter (or vice-versa) who surely knows what a difference a new coat of paint can make…
“Ready To Go”:
Written by Chris Wills & Steven Colyer
Produced by Steven Colyer
Mixed by Ingmar Carlson
Mastered by Ruairi O’Flaherty at Nomograph Mastering