Music and pro wrestling have a lot in common—the stratification of the big leagues and independents, the necessity of hitting the road to put bodies and livelihoods on the line, the harsh reality of playing to empty rooms. A passion for many, a paycheck for few, each a complex world unto itself with its own aesthetics, ethics, and language. Brooklyn band Jobber clearly understand the parallels, their love for wrestling coming through in their name, artwork, song titles, and lyrics. On their debut EP Hell in a Cell (out on Exploding in Sound), Jobber adopt wrestling’s insider language to explore workplace discontent and the struggle to be a good person in a shitty world. It’s a gimmick, sure, but it works.
Across four tracks (and a great introductory promo cut by the Hardcore Legend, Mick Foley), Jobber set thoughtful lyrics to smartly-written pop songs with massive guitars, a potent combination that pulls as much from the locked-in power pop of The Cars and the catchy alt-rock of Helium and The Breeders as their more obvious guitar-worshipping predecessors in Helmet, Hum, and Failure. That’s a lot of sonic ground to cover, but Jobber manage to find a great balance of heavy riffing and sweet melody, dissonance and delicacy all contained by sharp songwriting and powerful, layered production.
Title track “Hell in a Cell” kicks off the EP with Jobber’s clearest statement of intent: sludgy riffs cut with woozy jangle and tender vocal melodies, gradually building to an anthemic bridge. Kate Meizner’s lyrics about a wrestler preparing for a potentially career-ending fall from a 20-foot steel cage humanize the spectacle and apply it to the more mundane “hell in a cell” of an abusive office job, the closing refrain “Why won’t you put me over? / Why would you put him over?” a frustrated plea to a capricious system that rarely rewards its hardest workers.
“Entrance Theme” steers harder into pop territory, its chugging guitars and modulated synth lead clearly evoking the airtight precision of The Cars while maintaining some of that indie rock fuzziness and a great, dissonant instrumental bridge. Its lyrics on empty gesturing about climate change complement the following track, “No Holds Barred,” a slacker rock anthem built for 90s alternative radio that takes the tech bro elite to task in the EP’s best chorus: “Destruction’s not what I came here for / Bad boys in plaid they fucked up my world tour / Visionaries kill canaries / Let’s go and shoot em to the moon.” The EP closes with “Heel Turn,” a slower, spacier reconfiguration of the earlier tracks’ heaviness, its personal lyrics drawing on the wrestling convention of “turning heel”—going bad, becoming a villain—to express the anxiety of trying to make good choices while avoiding past mistakes.
The common wisdom about gimmicks in professional wrestling is the best ones aren’t fully fictional cartoon characters, but a wrestler’s real personality turned up to 11—all those authentic bits of charm and hubris and anxiety amplified to fill an arena. The gimmick is a big, loud point of connection between the performer and audience that can drive surprisingly subtle storytelling. Their wrestling gimmick might turn off some highbrow indie snobs, but on Hell in a Cell, Jobber take small moments of introspection and frustration, crank the volume, and get themselves over. - Mark Wadley