"Look, I'm not a diva or anything, but I want my pink wig," says Savage the following morning, making instructions for his stage wardrobe later. The wig is to Savage what the beads are to Brown. "Life doesn't feel real sometimes," he says, curiously, of being in a rock band. "So you find yourself gravitating towards these peculiar talismans. 'Oh, I wear this hat now.' Or, 'I wear a wig now!'" Missing wig aside, morale remains high despite the second-day hangover and the biblical rain during another full day of filming. The minibar—which lives in their minder's purse—is keeping them well oiled as they swig tequila and prepare to jump up and down before the camera while singing "Wide Awake!" Its beat is so Talking Heads–y it renders David Byrne's solo return redundant. "It's a tongue-in-cheek song about being awake, in the sense that people use the term 'woke' now," explains Savage.

"There's a kind of indignation that young people have: You're the old guard, I'm the new guard. Like any changing of hands, it can be at its best awkward, at its worst frightening," he says. "'Wide Awake!' is this moment of joy—an epiphany." They put so much into channeling its euphoria in their dance moves that Savage splits his pants in the crotch and runs back to the hotel to sew them together. This pink wig is not at the hotel. It's gone awry. It's a cheap piece of garbage, but he's placed value on it. His wig helps him understand who he is.

Savage is clear about the identity of Parquet Courts by now. In an Uber to the soundcheck for tonight's gig, he critiques the radio. "This is a 'whoa rock' station," he says, highlighting the limits of mainstream guitar music—light on lyrics, big on stadium calls-to-whoa. "Coldplay are the pioneers of 'whoa rock.' " The Lumineers inevitably come on next. "Now, The Lumineers are 'hey rock.' There's a difference." The album Wide Awake!, due in May, is neither "whoa rock" nor "hey rock." It's workmanlike rock; rock crafted from Savage's hardcore fandom; rock molded to make you shake and rattle and roll; rock to enhance or expel the rage and despair you feel about everything that exists outside your front door.