Friendship knows what they don’t know, which is just about everything. On their new collection, Caveman Wakes Up, life seems to be a mystery. The first line of their single, Free Association, says it all: “Thought I was wise, thought I knew about love.” Dan Wriggins makes clear that what he doesn’t know these days outweighs what he does, which is the case for most of us. We’re nowhere near as wise as we thought, and the more we experience love, the less we know.
Hollow Skulls seems to follow a similar path. “Caveman wakes up on a Sunday night/ Doesn’t want to disturb his wife.” Wriggins realises that the dream we believe doesn’t exist. Like Sisyphus attempting to roll the stone up the hill, the top is always out of reach. There’s a melancholy attitude to Peter Gill’s guitar, even as Michael Cormier-O’Leary’s drums snap the beat and Jon Samuel’s bass attempts to keep the song’s sadness at bay. And the sadness is there in spades, “Not a whole lot going on/ Never have I seen the stars so boring.” The song seems to end a couple of times, Wriggins realises he still has more to say.
Relating his life to Betty Ford, he seems to find solace in the tale of a survivor talking about her own experiences at a time when alcoholism was still taboo. The sturdy guitar playing seems to give the song more of a country feel as Wriggins sings, “I saw a video on the life of Betty Ford/ Had me tearing up/ I’ve been in pain 10 miles away/ I tried everything I could think of to cover it up.” As sturdy as the playing is, there are notes indicating that the path isn’t always simple and straightforward. In the darkness, there may be stumbles giving things an off-key air.
The sound of the flute that opens Love Vape thrusts you into a world where perfection isn’t even an option. The guitars move with a bounce as his relationship slips away, “Too late to turn back now/ if you don’t know how to end it you can just fade out/ You know what happens when you wait too long/ You don’t want that fear coming on…/ You wind up making things true“; less a song than a conversation with himself.
Ending the album, Fantasia offers Wriggins’ illusion of a more perfect world. Amidst Adelyn Strei’s flute and clarinet combined with Jason Calhoun’s violin, the song envisions what could be: “Imagine loving me, like you have everything.” It’s a final moment of fragile beauty, although perhaps nothing more than a whim.
Caveman Wakes Up looks for answers, knowing they aren’t always there. Friendship doesn’t have all the answers, but the struggle continues. We struggle, we learn, we live, we have Friendship.
Caveman Wakes Up (May 16th, 2025) Merge Records