Review: Andrew W.K.'s I Get Wet

Here’s the thing. Andrew W.K. loves partying. He loves it a lot. In fact, it doesn’t matter who you are, or what you have, or what you do. Your wife, children, career, maybe the house you’ve built with your own two hands. You will never love anything as much as Andrew W.K. loves to party. That’s what this entire album is about, partying, and the girls at parties, and how much fun it is to party.

It’s barely thirty minutes long, just one full-out rock song after another, every one of them in the most traditional of structures of verse-chorus-bridge. No deviation anywhere. But it’s great, and I’ll tell you why: This is glam-laden rock and roll in the exact vein of Motley Crue, Ratt, Twisted Sister, and countless others.

The constant glamorization of the nightlife, sex, and booze is instantly displayed in the song titles themselves, Party Hard, Take It Off, Party Till You Puke, Fun Night, et cetera. Every song is essentially the same as the one before it, and the tongue-in-cheek humor of the whole thing is laid on a bit thick, Andrew’s party-lust never, ever lets up.

Thankfully, the lyrics aren’t too bad, and the songs are written pretty well, and the vocals are strong and catchy. Guitars, drums, and keyboards and pianos make up everything you’ll hear on the record, and it’s only very occasional that all instruments aren’t on full blast, the very nice opening of She Is Beautiful is a perfect example of the potential for shredding and even greater rocking out that is sadly not a part of the album as a whole.

There’s very little to say about I Get Wet. It’s a rock album that is exclusively about partying, puking, and fucking. If you enjoy the 80’s material (Motley Crue’s She Goes Down comes to mind) it’s derived from, then you’ll do yourself a solid by giving W.K.’s debut album a listen.