If the long awaited Cagney & Lacey movie ever comes to fruition (sorry, I don’t consider the TV movies canon) I’m going to immediately start an online petition to make "Asphalt Homeland" the opening credit music–played as the camera slowly pans over the asphalt homeland of Lower Midtown Manhattan until landing on our two sometimes harried but always resolutely determined lady detectives. And sure, the new single by Ghost Funk Orchestra is a good deal less boob-tube bouncy and peppy than the original TV theme song, but that’s good because it’ll help Cagney & Lacey make the transition to the big screen with the help of some dramatic, cinematic music.

Of course this isn’t to imply that bandleader/songwriter/arranger/producer Seth Applebaum only writes music appropriate for a Cagney & Lacey type show. To the contrary, Seth is a one-man "library music" machine whose music could just as easily be used to score urban dramas, medical dramas, gangster epics, or even wild comedies and super action films but with a distinct golden-era approach harkening back to a time when jazz and funk and rock and Latin music and psychedelic music (and many other genres besides) often shared equal space on a single soundtrack.

Take the song called "Fuzzy Logic" for example (see video above) which stays true to its title by rejecting Boolean either/or logic in favor of multiplicity and suggestive ambiguity. It starts off sounding like the dramatic opening moments to a classic spy soundtrack or a caper movie with its dissonant stabs of brass and syncopated hi-hat cymbal–not to mention how the music video’s use of color gels and multiple exposure give it a strong Bond pre-credit sequence vibe–before sliding into a groove that’s laid back enough to be Sade-approved but with some vaguely uneasy lyrics (and a brief Bill Withers "I know" interlude, may he rest in peace) sung to enchanting effect by regular vocal collaborator Romi Hanoch (PowerSnap). And then about one minute in the song takes another turn with a breakdown section featuring flamenco-style clapping and dub-like echo and surf guitar reverb before circling back to the second verse and then later ending with a concise but still pretty epic solo outro traded between baritone sax and flute.

Seriously, put this song on in the car next time you’re cruising around and it’s guaranteed to make you feel like a total badass even if you’re just heading to 7-11. Or put on almost any GFO song because they rarely skimp on the funkiness, the ghostliness, or the intricate orchestrations. And did I say "one-man show"? In reality, Ghost Funk Orchestra is more like a ten-to-twelve-man-and-woman machine because you know it can’t be easy making music this elaborate alone and especially not if you plan to play live. And by the way seeing GFO live is a wonderful thing that will presumably happen again someday soon. 

So, if you lack familiarity with the Ghost Funk prior to "Asphalt Homeland," their most recent full-length An Ode To Escapism (2020) is a good place. The album features a shift array of musical emotional hues that still manage to flow together as a continuous whole–more that fulfilling the promise of the album’s title. And just case you happen to forget the stated purpose of the album while listening there’s an intermittent GPS Lady voiceover reminding you that "as long as your headphones are on…you’re safe, and hidden" and it never hurts to be reminded of that. (Jason Lee)

Mars Rodriguez is an independently-operating, Los-Angeles-based, Nicaraguan-American singer-songwriter-producer-multi-instrumentalist and so far her early releases are living up to that multi-hyphenate description. Mars released her first full-length last September, Don’t Wait for Nothing, and over its 30 minutes you never have to wait too long for some new sonic wrinkle or other musical ingredient to be thrown into the mix which makes for a compelling and propulsive listening experience. And while I may be reading too much into things here, I could see how this restlessness could possibly derive in part from being part of a population displaced by political crisis and state violence.

If forced to come up with my own original hyphenate to describe Mars Rodriguez’s music I think I’d go with "Café-Tacuba-meets-Shirley-Manson-meets-Massive Attack" because that at least hints at the stylistic eclecticism and the multilingualism and the mix of grungy guitar, power pop melodies, trip hop ambience, dub- and psych-inspired production, rock-en-espanol rhythms and drum machine rhythms. It’s one of those albums meant to be taken in all at once in full, a continuous sonic journey.

Take the album-opening instrumental track "Tous Les Jours" for example, which starts off with almost a full minute of ambient planetarium-style celestial sounds before launching into a funky percussion loop that wouldn’t sound out of place in a Chemical Brothers song and then a fuzzed-out zig-zagging melody that brings to mind Radiohead’s "Myxomatosis" or it does to my mind at least. After a minute or two the fuzzone starts to disintegrate and get swallowed up by swirling echo effects. Then the whole thing topples and transforms into a slower, stripped down groove–but with vibrating tones and reverb-drenched voices still hovering overhead before fading out to sounds of distorted radio signals and sine waves.

From there each subsequent song on Don’t Wait for Nothing explore a new direction or two. One of these directions is the "potential pop crossover hit" and there would seem to be at least a couple on the album–like "Now" with it’s singalong refrain and motivational message and steady build to a big finish–but always with a quirky touch or two to keep it more on the alternative side of things. Mars’s new single released on Friday ("The End") continues down this path of pop music with frayed edges–evoking Brian Eno one moment and Republica the next, with the listener exhorted to "exit your mind". And with all this talk of ends and exits, here’s to new beginnings because I’ll bet Mars Rodriguez has some more interesting ideas in store. (Jason Lee)

Here at Deli Enterprises Inc. we don’t cover nearly enough of the freak folk. And so to make amends we present the debut single out today by Anastasia Coope called “Norma Ray.”

Or not. Because there’s really no obvious label to apply to this music (plus who am I to gauge the level of freakiness?) which is an encouraging thing to say about any new artist. About the best way I can come up to describe the sound of “Norma Ray” is to say it’s like if Liz Phair went in a more experimental ambient post-rock direction early in her career (or later in her career). Or like if PJ Harvey made a psychedelic acoustic album produced by Brian Eno. Or like if Joanna Newsom hired Jane Birkin, Kate Bush, and Diamanda Galas as backing vocalists and gave them an echo box and told them to imitate a flock of seagulls. No, not the band, actual seagulls. Or like if…well, just listen to the song below and insert your own scenario because I don’t get paid by the musical simile sorry to say.

Anyway we have it straight from Anastasia herself that she “draws from influences such as Vashti Bunyan, Family Fodder, David Berman, Animal Collective, and early electronic composers in the vein of Daphne Oram” and that she’s also way into “Stereolab, the Everly Brothers, Steve Reich, Neu!, Pylon, Silver Jews, Spacemen 3, Faust, Broadcast, and many more” which means there is probably some more interesting music coming down the pike because that’s quite a list. (editors note: see the Purple Mountains/David Berman ((RIP)) cover version appended at the bottom of this entry)

Anastasia goes on to explain she “began writing music in a serious sense when quarantine began” and that she “continued this endeavor throughout my first year at Pratt Institute where I study painting.” Which points to some interesting parallels between some of Ms. Coope’s paintings with their oversized pointillistic portraiture (check out some of the paintings here) and the musical architecture of “Norma Ray” with its swarm of pinging echoes moving across the stereo spectrum like dots against an open-skied horizon created by faraway avian creatures in flight. And speaking of avian creatures in flight, I feel like this must be something like what bats hear when navigating by bio sonar aka “echolocation” and hey there’s a good name for this musical style or we could go with batcore instead. (did I say seagulls before well nevermind)

So, like, “Norma Ray” is a cool headphone listen for sure and it may even serve as good bio-sonar training for aspiring vampires. But the unorthodox vocal sounds are grounded by acoustic guitar backing and a small choir of overdubbed voices singing incantatory phrases in unison meaning this song could be used to ward off vampires and vampire bats too maybe. Quoting from Anastasia’s bandcamp page the combined effect is both “disruptive and whimsical” and that’s pretty dead-on, much like a tragicomic mime who experiences love and loss with a ragtag traveling circus or better yet a moonstruck Pierrot. And speaking of Pierrot Lunaire the seductive sonic disorientation of "Norma Ray" is mirrored in the song’s lyrics with its opening image of reflective surfaces (“maybe five screens will do what she wants them too”) a line that’s repeated and refracted through a new melodic contour followed by additional shards of impressionistic imagery and interior thoughts.

In conclusion, you can take your pick whether the song is more like a Kate Bush fever dream or a gaggle of vampire bats or a transitional Fellini movie or a ritual of mystical incantation or the musings of a moonstruck clown–or maybe if we’re judging by the title it’s an imagined dialogue between the nearly-titular labor activist and surrealist painter/photographer May Ray because why not. (editor’s note: remember, you don’t get paid per simile or metaphor) But whatever. The real takeaway is that Anastasia Coope paints a vivid, memorable picture in just under two minutes even if you can’t quite make out what the picture represents which is probably why I used/abused the word "like" eleven times in the text above. (Jason Lee)

Based on the music video below–presented here for the very first time anywhere, a DELI exclusive premiered in collaboration with our new DELI TV affiliate–the young men of Pan Arcadia give off a strong Meet Me In The Bathroom vibe. And bigger picture, this music video brings to mind New York City’s long and storied history of black-jacketed miscreants and misanthropes who are all still too lovable not to love like Lou Reed or the Ramones or the Strokes for example. So maybe it’s no coincidence that all the aforementioned artists also liked to hang out on NYC rooftops, especially with some beer and a pack of smokes handy.

And not only did they hang out on rooftops in their formative years but there’s a less noted but equally important shared trait between Lou Reed, the Ramones, the Strokes, et al. in that they were all also (or still are) great pop songwriters, at least when they wanted to be, with a proven track record for creating just the right mix of earworm melodies and lyrical phrases backed by musical textures and rhythms and bottom end (bass is the place) to produce an undeniable physical and mental frission in the listener even when, or especially when, joined with abrasive sounds and attitude.

So not to put too much pressure on the gentlemen of Pan Arcadia, but they seem to have a knack for joining these elements together in an appealing way too. Take the song "Drag It Out" for example, taken from their debut EP Weeks Ago that’s available on all and I mean all platforms, which does anything but drag itself out. In fact after the reverse fade-in it leaps straight into the main guitar hook (warning: this melody will get stuck in your head after a couple listens) played first with stripped down rhythm section backing and then with full on rawk energy before quickly bringing things down again along with some self-reflective lyrics and phased guitar chords in the background. But then things start ramping up again with some palm-muted guitar arpeggios moving into the pre-chorus where it’s declared "we can drink until the dawn" and I’m grateful for that and then launching into a full-throated chorus featuring the title phrase with backed by a Greek chorus from the other band members which then transitions into a brief guitar solo featuring a tasty opening lick and then back to another iteration of the whole enchilada and then the big ending which ends on an unexpected major chord. And all this in just over three minutes. Welcome to Songwriting 101.

"Drag It Out" is also a good example of the classic songwriting trick of combining downbeat sentiments with unbeat music and as revealed to the Deli by one of the band members from an undisclosed location (possibly the location pictured above, the rumored hideaway and work space of Pan Arcadia): "The song’s about wanting to extend something past its time: a night, relationship, human existence etc and dragging it out for drags sake–a feeling that was all around us last year stuck in a box with the world going to shite" and I couldn’t have said it better myself. Here’s another song off the EP.

In conclusion I recommend you keep an eye on these boys because they may be up to something. Like they were about a month ago when Pan Arcadia partnered with the Sweet Relief Musicians Fund to present two days of streaming live music featuring several dozen artists all to raise money and help Save the Scene. So, you see, underneath the black leather and the nice hair and the rooftop partying you just know these guys are cool like Fonzie in every sense and that they know how to write a song. (Jason Lee)

A couple years ago I got a chance to see Yeti: Giant of the 20th Century on the big screen—a film first released in 1977 to capitalize on the recent hit King Kong remake starring Jessica Lange—and boy I’m glad I did. An Italian film production shot in Canada and then poorly dubbed into English, Yeti: Got2C tells the familiar story of what happens when boy meets Yeti, grandfather of boy attempts to exploit Yeti as corporate mascot, sister of boy inadvertently seduces Yeti after brushing up against his gigantic nipple, gang of miscreants frame Yeti for murder and get the public to call for his head, Yeti gets fed up and ransacks Toronto, dog belonging to boy saves Yeti from gang of miscreants, boy and dog run across field towards each other in slow motion and meet in final ecstatic embrace. The End.

I’m sharing this absurd movie synopsis not only because the album discussed here also has “Yeti” in its name or because now I know you want to watch it immediately, but also because I bet that if El Michels Affair could go back in time that they would end up happy and well-compensated by writing soundtracks for movies just like this one–tho’ not only Yeti-sploitation movies of course but also Spaghetti Westerns and Italo giallo shockers and conspiracy thrillers and Kung-Fu/martial arts movies of course, plus writing music to go with whatever other movie genres and trends are popular at the drive-in at the time. And conversely I could see the 70s Italian Yeti entering the El Michels Affair universe because if you took the super funky opening theme song to Yeti: Giant of the 20th Century (called "Yeti" and credited to The Yetians, naturally) and slipped it onto an El Michels Affair album then I think I’d probably be none the wiser and you could even do that with some of the other music from the soundtrack too.

Likewise, if you took the cover image from the 1977 "Yeti" 45-rpm promotional vinyl single (thank you, Internet) which features our hulking hero positioned in such a way that he appears either to be dancing or to be squatting and about to take a Yeti sized dump (the weird almost sheepish expression I dunno) with the words “funky disco sound” superimposed over his hairy crotch (talk about potentially funky in more way than one) all set against the backdrop of a blue-tinted, badly blown-up photograph of the Yeti’s ancestral home on a rocky mountain somewhere, and then if you told me this was the cover image to the new EMA album I would totally believe you because the soundtrack song cover image fits so perfectly with the playful cut-and-paste aesthetic of EMA’s music plus it’s vaguely psychedelic feel (on this new album especially) and equally with EMA’s sly sense of humor and the pure kick-assitude of the band’s "funky disco sound," so that when you peep the real cover below it’s more than a little uncanny how there’s a blueish, cartoonish backdrop there too with yellow lettering and how the Yetis are both in a similarly off-center foregrounded position and how in both images it clearly looks like a man in a Yeti suit. The only major difference I see between the two record covers is that the Yeti in the EMA version has a kid in his arms and its the kid who is possibly dancing. 

Really and truly, I’m trying to avoid spreading conspiracy theories in this space about purported connections between this film and this album, but it’s not easy when you find so much overwhelming evidence and plus you know how people today love their conspiracies so maybe I should write a book or something.

And sure ok, the band’s namesake leader, arranger, producer and multi-instrumentalist Leon Michels has shared an origin story for the album’s title with another magazine that shall remain nameless and the story doesn’t involve Yeti: Giant of the 20th Century. Still, I’m not convinced, because who tells the truth in the pages of the Rolling Stone anyway? But even if Leon Michels isn’t a time-traveler in real life I can see why he would call his music "cinematic soul" because there’s such a kinship to my ears between the sounds on the album and some of the sounds I’ve heard not only in Italian film music but also in soundtracks from Bollywood and Nollywood and other global film industries making productions designed to be polyglot, and aimed at multi-lingual and multi-ethnic audiences. So perhaps no mistake that from around the late ’60s to maybe the early ’80s a good number of these soundtracks pointed the way to a nascent "world music" sensibliity based on globe-spanning eclecticism, but at the same time equally based on a bedrock of melodic hooks and funk grooves and tight arrangements.

And so thank goodness that El Michels Affair is out here in 2021 making cinematic soul soundtracks for these modern times, because I’m not really quite comfortable going back to the movies yet, and EMA’s music makes it easy to create movies in your head. Like on the 2020 release Adult Themes which–fair warning, be prepared to take its title literally–provides the listener with a series of sweeping, pulsing musical themes to an imaginary film of the sexy variety, probably quite similar to the movies that would run for months on end in Times Square until Deep Throat came along and got the mafia involved, that could provoke your mind to make some movies that will fully solve the mind-body paradox once and for all. But if that sounds too taxing then I’d recommendYeti Season instead, because to my ears it aspires to a more spiritually-inclined form of elevation that’s ideal for creating critical-hit Oscar-bait movies in your head. But just to be clear, the funk is still in effect on Yeti Season. It’s just a little more mellow overall and also the funk gets mixed to intriguing effect with everything from a stately overture played by Turkish-American qanun master Tamer Pinarbasi ("Fazed Out") to some exquisite and emotive singing by Piya Malik (Say She She) on four tracks to some strong doses of the Turkish psych pop and folk rock styles that served as one of the musical inspirations to the project according to Michels himself.

So in closing this all makes me think that fake soundtrack music should be more widespread today–not only for the benefit of movie-in-our-heads makers but also for composers because the fake soundtrack is a great concept to inspire stretching out and exploring new sounds and new creative pathways and who knows maybe new career opportunities too. For even if El Michels Affair has a lock on not-faking-the-funk on film right now, it can’t last forever. And when it ends, who will write disco funk anthems for future generations and for future sad-eyed Yetis if not you? (Jason Lee)

Stas THEE Boss kept impressively busy in 2020 by releasing two impressive EPs, guesting on the most recent single (“Mega Church”) by space-rap commanders Shabazz Palaces, and oh yeah moving from her native Seattle to Brooklyn. Pretty impressive for a year otherwise marked by pestilence, political and social turmoil, soy sauce challenges and toilet paper wars. 

As one half of the now defunct THEESatisfaction—whose legacy includes 2 LPs on Sub Pop and a truly slept on EP called Sandra Bollocks Black Baby—the rapper, producer, beatmaker, and Black Constellation collectivist has continued her explorations across a range of musical territories ranging from breakup albums to instrumental records, but never straying too far from her trademark futurist vibes and polysyllabic rhymes (well, not on the instrumental records) and sharp sense of humor. 

On her first EP of 2020, On the Quarner, Stas THEE Boss gifts the listener with a Miles Davis-referencing tone poem weaving together 12 miniature compositions into one seamless piece of music chock full of blissed out beats and head spinning bars and livestreaming memes and Liquid Swords samples and Earl Sweatshirt song quotations and unsolicited invitations to a blind date at the Cheesecake Factory, and on her second EP, recorded after moving to Brooklyn, the listener is presented with woozy psychedelic-soul grooves and seductive vocals, mostly sung rather than rapped as indicated by its exclamatory title, Sang Stasia! 

While you may expect all this activity to merit a day off come 2021, on New Years Day she posted a new single which I’m going to go ahead and declare the party jam of the year called “Pandemy Stimmy.” Rapping alongside Nappy Nina and over a pared down steel drum and drum machine beat Stas lays out her demands to the new administration: “Joe Biden better run the bag / the cabinet better be black” then goes on to advocate that they “abolish the prisons and feds” plus the “Nazis and Confederates” and who can argue with any of this. And also, who can say romance and politics don’t mix when Stas pulls off “politicking for bread [with] a poly bitch in my bed.”

Even now Stas THEE Boss is still out on the campaign trail—dropping a new track on Bandcamp just the week before last called “Pretty Boy in Spring Colors” which sounds to my ears ready made for On the Quarner 2 (hey, I can dream) and then earlier this week a new video appeared for one of the mini-compositions from Quarner itself called “Penny” featuring Stas as an astronaut floating in space (see video at top of page) or perhaps on a soundstage in St. Petersburg, Russia if its closing credits are on the level. So here’s to wishing Stas THEE Boss safe travels both to and from other spheres and a continued busy 2021 and welcome to Brooklyn… (Jason Lee)

Take a listen to “It Won’t Hurt You” off the Triptides’ new album Alter Echoes and you’re sure to feel free as a bird flying eight miles high over the Sunset Strip that is until your strawberry colored alarm clock wakes you from your slumber and you rise from your mushroom-imprinted pillow to face another rainy day. 

While I can’t say for sure if that’s a Rickenbacker guitar being played on the track it sure as heck sounds like it (note: now confirmed to be a Ric 360!)  and either way these Angelinos have captured a certain classic LA World vibe and sound on the entire album that would no doubt have Russ Meyer salivating all over his ascot to hire these boys as the house band for the Hollywood bungalow party scene in his new movie titled The Immortal Pussycat Beyond the Motorpsycho Valley of the Mudhoney Vixens Kill Kill! were he not a long dead mazophiliac. 

So, not to dwell on this one song but it’s also got bongos, or congas at least, and about 25 seconds into the thing a maraca and a guitar countermelody enter simultaneously with some sweet stereo separation and really the album is chock full of these nice arranging and production touches so you can use it to show off your hi-fi system to your honey and everybody wins.

For example you’ll hear the old we trick of feeding a vocal part through a Leslie speaker on “Do You Ever Wonder?” and then a little later the sudden transition to a half-time Floydian blissed out freakout towards the end of “Let It Go” which then reverts back to its original upbeat jingle-jangle by its conclusion and also there’s the day-glo smeared psychedelic coda to “Hand of Time” which is groovy too. 

On its back half the album mellows out significantly (but what so you expect from the B-side) before the Triptides decide to end things on an up note with the frug-ready “Now and Then” sending their more dance-inclined patrons home happy. So hey, if any of this sounds appealing the Deli says ch-check it out! (Jason Lee)

The first Earthly arrival of Starchild was mid-wifed from within George Clinton’s Afrofuturist musical universe (which I’ll gladly take over the Marvel Universe any day, just take a look at the “P-Funk Mythology” page on Wikipedia) arriving in this world via the 1975 Parliament single “Mothership Connection (Star Child)” where our titular hero announced to Earthlings that “we have returned to reclaim the Pyramids” before introducing the “Swing down, sweet chariot” hook later sampled on Dr. Dre’s 1993 hit “Let Me Ride” which introduced P-Funk via G-Funk to Generation X.

Well the second coming has come. And Brooklyn is the lucky host to the reincarnated Starchild in the form of Bryndon Cook. Having travelled the universe and beyond before landing permanently in these parts, this Starchild keeps some pretty rarified company having logged time as touring guitarist for Solange and Chairlift and Blood Orange, while also collaborating with the latter as VeilHymn, before venturing out as front-alien for Starchild & The New Romantic—a project that melds Cook’s R&B and hip hop and indie rock ‘n pop leanings into one musical package and very effectively so on the album released last year called Forever.

And more recently Starchild was shot back out into outer space ET-style to perform a couple live-streamed sets on Elsewhere Sound Space, a monthly series broadcast on the über-äwesome nightclub’s Twitch channel, all originating from an undisclosed location aboard a spaceship marooned in a galaxy far, far away. And lucky for us the Starchild episode is still available to stream and you won’t regret the alien encounter because Bryndon Cook’s heartfelt musical vignettes set in the midst of some pretty trippy sci-fi visuals is likely to make your soul leave your body especially on his final number “Silent Disco,” a transcendent ditty during which Starchild’s soul does in fact visibly leave his Earthbound bodysuit behind and enter another dimension.

Based on the first couple of episodes of Elsewhere Sound Space with their eerie eye candy tableaux and occasional space lizard appearances combined with cosmic musical numbers interspersed with broad comedy segments (double entendre not intended) the overall effect is like a surrealist mashup of the movie version of Dune and the notorious Star Wars Holiday Special, except that the campiness found on this mothership is clearly neither unintentional nor apolitical (take that Susan Sontag!) and instead of Bea Arthur serenading the Cantina Bar you get Princess Nokia and Starchild and in the next installment this Tuesday Brooklyn rapper and NYC mayoral candidate Paperboy Prince serenading all of us pod people out here wandering aimlessly in cyberspace.

And isn’t it about time someone presented a compellingly queer vision of outer space and damn if the team at Elsewhere Sound Space–fronted by the program’s emcee Peter Smith who as "a music deity marooned in space" radiates warmth into the coldest reaches of universe, check out the profile published in the NY Times titled “Five Nonbinary Comics on This Moment”—haven’t done it. Because c’mon even your neighborhood quantum physicist knows that outer space is all about relativity and multi-dimensionality and the bending of timespace which all sounds pretty queer to me. (Jason Lee)

Check out the second advance single by Acid Dad in advance of their upcoming album Take It From The Dead coming out early this summer (6/11) on Greenway Records and Reverberation Appreciation Society.

The song is called "BBQ" and it’s a muy fuego scorcher that’ll remind you of Homer Simpson lighting up the grill with an entire can of lighter fluid and sending a fireball careening into the sky, or it does me at least, with its steady driving psych riddims and heavy duty riffage and blunted out vocal spliffage (I had hoped this may be a neologism but Urban Dictionary proved otherwise of course) declaiming "I will be there / I wanna be there in my head / I can take it / I can’t take it for the dead" or something damn close to that.

And then once you’re done with your first listen you may want to check out the song’s "visualizer" on Levitation’s YouDoob page (or witness it above) which’ll give you a sensation something like staring into your dad’s old lava lamp after dropping acid with dear ol’ dad.

And wouldn’t you know it "to accompany the new record, the band spent the last year collaborating with video artist Webb Hunt producing psych and glitch art videos that form a visual counterpart to the dreamy distortions of their sound" so look for lots more LSD-infused lava lamp action coming soon. (Jason Lee)

 Don’t let the name fool you. Johnny Dynamite and the Bloodsuckers sounds like it should be the name of a ‘50s tribute act that’d currently be touring the oldies circuit with Sha Na Na if not for deadly pathogens. But while their actual sound may diverge sharply from the Boomer generation, Mr. Dynamite does share a certain ethos with the early rock ‘n’ rollers in terms of emotive authenticity and sonic immediacy. He just happens to go heavier on the drum machines and the synthesizers than an old school piano pounder like Jerry Lee Lewis.

When he’s not busy hanging out with the Bloodsuckers, Johnny can be found pounding the non-digital skins for dynamite local bands like Whiner and Ashjesus or manning the boards on recordings by other artists. If you wanna know more check out this interview with Dynamite from shortly before everything went to sh*t conducted by Tom Gallo of Radio Free Brooklyn and Look At My Records! fame that focuses on the 2020 debut album Heartbroken.

So it’s just my own take of course but when I listen to Johnny Dynamite and the Bloodsuckers I hear traces of OMD’s groundbreaking electro artpop, the indie-defining delicate yet driving sound of Sarah Records, the wobbly synths and modern psychedelia of MGMT, and finally, the chilled out and washed out ambience of, umm, Washed Out—with said chillness represented lyrically in the refrain of “Touch Like This” (one of many highlights on Heartbroken) which asks repeatedly “Why are you lying on the floor?”

But yeah, the whole pop music lineage given above is just a way of saying that J. Dynamite has his own thing going on if it takes this many reference points to describe his sound, and that he simply makes good solid pop music whatever the chosen touchstones.

Like on “Triflin’ Kids” the new single that perfectly synthesizes (pun intended) what Johnny’s got going on—opening with a woozy call-and-response synth hook that slides straight into a breathy seduction-minded verse, and when that doesn’t seem to work, a more direct appeal in the chorus that strips away the gauzy disco rhythms and the narrator’s loverman facade. 

And therein lies the twist in which the song’s unabashedly needy narrator takes the “bedroom” in “bedroom pop” pretty literally or tries to anyway—which acts as a musical tribute of sorts (full circle) since triflin’ kids are at the heart and the soul of so much of the most impactful pop music from the past to the present and god bless ‘em for that.

The musical project Patriarchy excels at much of what the patriarchy itself hates and fears most—like when a woman chooses to express herself in a sexually uninhibited manner or insists upon her own agency or mocks the self-serving rules and taboos of the patriarchy through sharp satirical humor or creates music that signifies and demands the power and the privilege inherent in not giving a fuck.

Quoting directly from their song “Hell Was Full,” it’s this writer’s theory that lead singer/songwriter/stylist/director and actress Actually Huizenga—one half of the self-described snuff-pop duo—has taken on the proverbial role of “the apple in the pig’s mouth [that’s] trying hard as fuck to swallow,” bringing about the downfall of the patriarchal pig whom she compels to “choke, choke, choke, choke” on his own lust and greed and “on the words that you never knew the meaning of” where one of those words could be “patriarchy” itself since Patriarchy clearly has a thing or two to teach about domination and authority. But whatever the validity of this interpretation you can and probably should click HERE for Huizenga’s own compellingly clear-eyed view of the patriarchy and of Patriarchy.

Patriarchy is the nom de bande of Huizenga alongside co-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Andrew Means (3Teeth) and their overall vibe and sound is perfectly summed up in the promotional copy that accompanied their late-2019 debut Asking For It so I’ll just quote from it here (paraphrasing slightly) with the album described as “a work exploring themes of sex, power, subversion & death with what appears to be an intense interest in Ancient Greek Mythology & 80’s slasher films, a heavy dose of Mulholland Drive, and a sound that is equal parts ABBA and NIN but leaning more toward the darker, heavier side of synth-punk/new-wave & industrial music.”

Skipping ahead to the present, earlier this year Patriarchy released Reverse Circumcision which true to its title adds new layers of transplanted “sonic skin” to songs first heard on Asking For It with individual tracks remixed and reimagined by a cavalcade of all-stars from EBM to industrial, darkwave to dream pop, ranging from key members of legends like Nitzer Ebb and Front Line Assembly and This Mortal Coil to fellow Angelinos like Drab Majesty (who adds a death disco sheen to “Burn the Witch”) and Geneva Jacuzzi (who turns “I Don’t Want To Die” into a pulsating electro-funk workout) and plenty of others who all combined will make you wanna “take your dick out and put it on the speaker” as commanded by Ms. Huizenga in the opening lines of “He Took It Out.” And don’t fret if you don’t have that particular appendage because everyone knows the phallus is nothing but a cultural construct so put your cultural construct on the speaker instead should you so choose.

One other neat thing about Reverse Circumcision is getting to hear different interpretations of the same track as we do for two Patriarchy originals. But the single takes are equally compelling, like the version of “Grind Your Bones” by Rhys Fulber (Front Line Assembly, Delerium) wherein he takes one of Patriarchy’s heavier riff-based numbers (“as the vultures tear / at your underwear / I’ll be there”) and surgically removes the riff and cuts up the song’s lyrics, transmutating the whole into a glitchy miasma of sound that’s either incredibly sensuous or cataclysmic or both, depending on your own ears, culminating with doomy ethereal synth chords and a distorted feral howl.

And if this gets your goat you can see and hear Rhys Fulber, along with Bon Harris of Nitzer Ebb, in conversation with Ms. Huizenga on Patriarchy’s recently live-streamed Bottom of the Pops (nice title) that first aired as a Christmas special (!!) featuring performances not available elsewhere plus some seasonally appropriate HSN style shopping segments. Just be forewarned this Xmas special is a long way from Burl Ives and not for the delicate of constitution which in our book makes it the best possible kind of Christmas special. 

And speaking of special, the follow up to Bottom of the Pops is on its way, slated to stream on March 20 at 6pm PST/9pm EST so check out Patriarchy’s Youtube channel and mark your calendars and while you’re waiting feast your eyes on some of Patriarchy’s existing music videos (plus Actually’s pre-Patriarchy body of work) because these self-directed clips tend to be visually lavish and gleefully transgressive and slyly amusing and overall something to behold. 

Which at last brings us (or maybe just me) full circle since I first learned about Actually Huizenga through the music visual dramatical arts—namely, her inspired performance in the likewise inspired Cody Critcheloe (aka SSION) directed clip for Lower Dens’ “To Die in L.A.” in which Huizenga commands the screen as an aspiring Hollywood screen siren who’s prone to waking dreams relating to bloody tooth trauma and buff pool boys and award acceptance speeches. (Jason Lee) 

Much like a certain storied pair of shiny shiny, shiny boots of leather, the music of Bootblacks is highly polished, austere and severe. And when it kicks you in the face you’ll beg for more, much like Severin in thrall to Wanda von Dunajew.

Residing somewhere in a batcave in Brooklyn (perhaps neighbors with Eddie Murphy?) these stalwart somber-hued postpunkers not too long ago released their forth full-length Thin Skies. Check out the music vid above for the full effect, and then give a listen to their Live At Saint Vitus set released in December.

Speaking of all thing Venusian, tonight Bootblacks appear as part of Cherry Bomb: International Women’s Day Charity Livestream originating straight outta Philly starting at 7pm EST with 12 bands & DJs benefiting 12 relevant charities with co-hosting duties shared by Lazy Astronomer and DJ Baby Berlin and streaming live on the latter’s Twitch channel. Click HERE for the full lineup and check out videos by a few of the other featured performers below.