Where do I begin with the strange genius of Rebecca DGD 5’s new single Feels Like Rock’n Roll? At the risk of presuming kindred association, a Billy Corgan quote comes to mind: “The deeper I get into my life as a musician, I’m discovering that it becomes less and less about other people, and more about what I want to do. And that’s a good place to be.” Such sentiments seem to perfectly compliment the nature of Feels Like Rock’n Roll, a controlled riff that has some of the strangest and most unlikely musical pairings of all time.
The opening starts with something of a sermon by Rebecca DGD 5, seemingly expressing in a sort of meta way her intentions with the song, right down to continuity with why the title is so decidedly plainspoken. “…Turn back to Jesus and Gospels of Truth/Thought there was enough then a Kissing Booth/Turns out, naugh, the dimples. Thanking God I outgrew the pimples,” she chants, with somewhat sneering undertone. Everything about the piece then takes a turn for the personal, with the chant steering away from nostalgic memories and personal sentiments to seemingly autobiographical and personal experience. It leaves one wondering what truly is being communicated at the heart of the track. Is this some sort of personal manifesto?
A story being told? Maybe some sort of social commentary wrapped up in the weirdest, most uncanny way? In the chorus, guest star Chago Williams bellows the titular “This feels like Rock’n’Roll,” yet the vocal expressions aren’t joyous. There’s a kind of a caustic sadness he’s able to bring with a visceral literality to the song. I’m not sure if this is entirely the right word, but there’s something almost mournful about the piece. Like the storytellers of the song’s narrative themes are looking back, not forward. The lyrics seem to imply some sort of regret, literal elements harkening back to the rebelliousness coming from growing up in a small town with Christian influence.
Patti Smith once said, “Sometimes you’re doing really well, then, after three or four years, everything inexplicably crashes like a house of cards and you have to rebuild it. It’s not like you get to a point where you’re all right for the rest of your life.” She also said, “Grief starts to become indulgent, and it doesn’t serve anyone, and it’s painful. But if you transform it into remembrance, then you’re magnifying the person you lost and also giving something of that person to other people, so they can experience something of that person.” The song feels like it has undertones of both sentiments.
There’s the painful wisps of nostalgia at the beginning of the track, undulating into something that morphs into an almost empowered chant by the end. The image Feels Like Rock’n Roll conjured up in my mind was sitting at the local watering hole. Beer in hand, looking at my reflection in the large mirror behind the bar. Moving from the shadows of memory into the matter-of-factness of present. The song would do well to be played in that sort of ambience. All in all while by no means a refined act, I’ll look forward because of aforementioned quality to what Rebecca DGD 5 does next.
Gwen Waggoner