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The Deathray Davies
(We featured this band on See You in the Pit last year, but here's a new and improved version!)
The lead singer of this six-piece Dallas band is blessed with a classic, sneering, snotty punk rock voice but chooses to pair it with sweet little melodies and big fat power pop harmonies, mixed up with touches of wacky theremin, fuzzed-out guitar lines, and more than a sprinkle of crashing drums, exuberant tambourine, and bouncy keyboards.
The Davies make good use of clever wordplay (one of my favorite lines of all time: "There's too much ulterior in your motive"), repeated motifs (check all the "They Stuck Me In A Box In The Ground" songs -- I think they're on "Part 9" by now), and an abundance of hooks ("I Regret The Day I Tried to Steal Daniel's Ego" and "Is This On?"). The chorus from "The Fall Fashions" seems to have been fashioned from the best parts of power pop, with triumphant horns on top. It could be easily mistaken for a Fountains of Wayne b-side. And all of the grown-up pop-punk kids will appreciate the bratty, infectious "Plan to Stay Awake," a song bouncing around like there's no tomorrow and gets stuck in my head for days at a time.
Their last album, The Kick and the Snare, was one of my sleeper favorites of 2005 which nobody else seems to have heard; ditto for 2003's Midnight at the Black Nail Polish Factory. The Deathray Davies are much like that obviously wasted, rambling, skinny hipster boy in the corner booth of the bar who can't stop talking about the same three things, but you still love him nonetheless because he's charming, sincere, and unpretentious; it's nothing entirely ground-breaking, but the pure joy in these songs is apparent in the first listen. Eminently danceable and tons of fun for those of you who appreciate retro-rock. It's lo-fi pop that meanders around, dreaming of being in the Kinks (or is that being the Kinks themselves?), hopping and bopping.
The Deathray Davies - The Fall Fashions
The Deathray Davies - Plan to Stay Awake
The Deathray Davies - The Girl Who Stole The Eiffel Tower
The Deathray Davies - Is This On?
The Deathray Davies - I Regret The Day I Tried to Steal Daniel's Ego
The Deathray Davies official site. Buy The Kick and the Snare from Amazon or the iTunes Music Store.
Shadows tags:thedeathraydavies.
Posted by Queen of the Front Row at 02.27.06 at 3:48 AM
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