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The Next Yo La Tengo? I’ve Never Listened To This Band Either

So there I was at a socially un-distanced party at a buddy’s lake house when someone asked if anyone has heard good new music. This girl chimed in and said she saw some band named Inexplicably Wet Hair got a decent review on Pitchfork that day, but no one had actually heard it yet.

And at that moment, we all came to a startling realization: Inexplicably Wet Hair is clearly the next Yo La Tengo!

And by that, I mean: a band you always see get consistently good reviews and decent placement on year-end or best-of-decade lists, but literally no one you will ever meet has listened to them. No one owns an album of theirs or has a concert ticket stub framed. You can’t find anyone who ever chose to watch them at a festival over Interpol or Tyler the Creator or Ween. You’ve never seen a merch shirt of theirs. Hell, I’m not entirely convinced Yo La Tengo exists.

So this all leads me to believe that Inexplicably Wet Hair is the second coming of Yo La Tengo. In researching further for this article, I decided to pull up Spotify and navigate to IWH’s page. The moment I hit play, a few minutes pass by in an instant; my brain feels like it was just listening to music, but I can’t remember what I just heard. Couldn’t even hum it. Did it happen? Did I hear music? Fuck if I know.

I’m going to be really honest with you here, and I’m trusting you with something embarrassing: I thought Yo La Tengo was a mariachi band until I was like 29. Admittedly, this is not my proudest cultural moment. I’ve grown a lot since then! And it’s not just a language thing: I actually bet money once that Archers of Loaf were some Jackass-inspired prank gang who shot up turds with crossbows. What I’m saying is: I’m not bright and I absolutely failed Spanish. And I still haven’t listened to Yo La.

But regardless, I don’t want to look like a moron, so both Inexplicably Wet Hair and Yo La Tengo are going to place highly on my year-end Top 50 Albums list.