BRIGITTE CALLS ME BABY ARE MAKING ROCK FEEL IRREVERSIBLE
Having just released their sophomore
album Irreversible, the Chicago
quartet draws upon a legacy of
rock legends for a sound wholly their own.
Words by Bea Isaacson
By the time I sit down with Brigitte Calls Me Baby in the quiet private bar of the Brixton Academy, The Vaccines downstairs are just starting up the first few tracks of their What Did You Expect From The Vaccines? album anniversary tour. They’ve been touring with beloved indie sleaze chroniclers for about a month now, and yet today is particularly notable for the Chicago rock group. Their sophomore album, Irreversible, was released just that morning.
Merging ‘80s post-punk rock with a modern indie sound, their performance, built on jagged guitar riffs and a mesmerising vocal performance, electrified the jumping London audience. Many – if not most – were hearing the album’s tracks for the first time. The trio received rousing applause after.
Mere minutes later, the band appear remarkably steady and stoic for this interview.
“It’s your life,” says frontman Wes Leavins. “You live and breathe it, so really, it never feels like you step away from it. It feels like you’re living in that world from the moment you step into the studio, to the moment you start touring the songs, and then suddenly that dream is over, and you enter the next one.” With brilliant blonde hair and kohl-lined eyes, the lead singer speaks thoughtfully, slow-paced and measured beyond his young years. There’s a touch of Bowie and Brandon Flowers to his aesthetic, Morrissey crooning with Jeff Buckley intensity within his near-hypnotic voice.
Composed of 11 songs total, the album opens with the lush, pulsing ‘There Always’, and includes the restless, festival-ready ‘Slumber Party’ standout, and the warm, thrilling ‘The Early Days of Love.’ Lyrically, the tunes explore themes of yearning love, jaded pining, and wry regret.
The great paradox of music is exploring utmost artistic freedom while expressing it boxed within a neat, sellable album. It’s something Brigitte Calls Me Baby accomplishes flawlessly. “The process is different song to song,” explains bassist Devin Wessels. “Generally, we start with an idea.”
“These guys got into the room and wrote the demo to ‘I Can Take The Sun Out Of The Sky” drummer Jeremy Benshish adds. “And then it was like, ok, the record is due tomorrow. So it still feels extremely fresh because of how recent this is, in October.”
“Jeremy cut drums in his childhood basement,” Leavins contributes. “I cut mine in my hometown in Texas. That’s the first time that’s ever happened.”
Brigitte Calls Me Baby is a rock band for rock lovers. In an overcrowded arena of post-pandemic music makers trying to carve out both an artistic niche and chart space, Irreversible is an impressively tight record that sounds utterly self-confident without ever sliding into indulgence. It is sonically thrilling, sure, but not immature: these are old souls behind the euphoric guitar slides, the Americana grandeur.
“Nothing says it better than the title Irreversible,” says Leavins. “I’m always trying to capture a feeling or a moment, and make it permanent. Like, here it is. Here’s a sonic sort of portrayal. The moment doesn’t last, but the song does.”
If their 2024 debut, The Future is Our Way Out, had echoes of ‘80s English and ‘90s New York rock, Irreversible widens the palette further, fusing Leavins’ yearning vocals with scintillating chords. There’s a dreamy, nostalgic quality at play here, yet it feels dramatic, not sleepy.
It’s not just an exciting time for Brigitte Calls Me Baby, but for rock music in general. While The Vaccines below us celebrate 15 years of their zeitgeist-defining album, the next wave of the genre is crackling with future-facing excitement. Geese bulldozed through end-of-year lists with their 2025 album Getting Killed; Black Country, New Road have earned an international following for their art-rock unpredictability.
“There’s no doubt a band like Geese is wholly authentic,” Leavins says. “You can tell it’s genuine. I think authenticity is another thing that maybe hasn’t been embraced as much, that is starting to come back.”
“I think the other piece that comes with the resurgence of rock is people being excited about bands,” Wessels says. “As a band ourselves, that’s very enticing to us. And there’s something very special about being in a band and actually functioning as a unit.”
It’s a pleasant post-gig conversation, no doubt one their own audiences will be having once the night is over. What is rock? What makes it so great? “It sounds corny, it sounds cliché, right?” Leavins drawls. “But I do believe that it’s the integrity, the intensity…”
“It’s having conviction,” Benshish says. “You can’t be timid.”
The three of them look at each other, and laugh.
