Cardiac Party
Teen Challenge
(Self-released)Cardiac Party singer Ryan McDowell had it all planned out: By including a package of Skittles with the copy of his band's new EP, Teen Challenge, he says, he was assured of getting at least one positive remark in my review. "The songs sucked, but the Skittles were delicious!" Actually, Teen Challenge is one of the better local records I've heard since I started this job -- even without the Skittles.

This Tempe-based indie/noise/electronica outfit is making the sort of super trendy keyboard-and-noisy-guitar music hipster-haters spend most of their waking hours actively despising, but it's hard to find anything worth not liking about this brilliant followup to their 2007 effort Cardiac Party R Cacti Yard, PA. I'm only passingly familiar with what the band sounded like back then -- mostly standard lo-fi indie rock garnished with small slices of lo-cal Peachcake -- but I'm comfortable calling this record a giant step forward. Actually, if I were them, I'd pull the first album off shelves immediately.
Even without the Skittles.

So lately our comments have been almost entirely spam, and the bulk of our friend requests self-promotional.

I've had a fairly laissez-faire and shruggy approach towards it.

Since every now then I've embarked on non-networking adding binges and have have had myspace relationships entirely based around the fact that we post fliers on each others' pages, I felt that deleting someone's flier on my comments page or denying a friend request for a band was outside of my personal realm of righteous indignation. I approve all requests. And let all comments waft.

But as a result, our band's myspace has devolved into a wasteland of spam and top-heavy with friends that probably don't  connect with our music. The whole enterprise just kind of skunks with the whiff of inauthenticity.

This obviously troubles me.

I'm planning on whittling down our friends list.

This process is not meant to be an evaluation of character or integrity. If I remove you, it's not because I hate you or your music. We probably just have no business being myspace friends. And I've approached networking the wrong way. And I feel saddled with all this clutter on our page and have to clean up and employ a higher standard of management for this page.

Ryan

 We were blessed with quite a nice write up from the wonderful peoples at baeblemusic.com music blog.

Here it is...

"Original" is probably the most overused word in the music industry right now, so much so that most 'unique' bands are just more of the same slop we digest on a daily basis, with a different name (and the same flavor). Always a fan of the raw, unmixed, guitar driven indie pop song that no one's ever heard of, we're constantly on the hunt for freshness, often failing miserably. Sometimes, it just plops into our open ears. Lets hope we don't have a heart attack before we hear more from Cardiac Party, because they might just put the sizzle back in buzz band.

Ok, so they aren't revolutionary. They don't break down harmonic structure or sing like shamans. They don't make incomprehensible noises. But they do write a twitchy, chopped up sing-along tune with kick, sass, and lyrics/song titles/sentiments straight from the book of strange. After all, they named their album after themselves (not in the conventional sense). Cardiac Party R Cactus Yard PA, the latter half of which, most clever music aficionados will note, is an anagram for the band name (first half?). We'd also like to note that "Noodle's Root" has a great ring to it (both literally and musically). While the track we hosted is the opener to the record, and is fairly straightforward, "Noodle" has an almost Neutral Milk Hotel nuance to it, with the signature incredibly distorted thingy, and an off-the-wall lyrical playground.

If Titus Andronicus can gain cred with low-fi wailings and fuzz, then this guys might be next. And with the announced hiatus of former Arizona favorites, (i.e. The Format), we need a new choice band from the desert state. Not that these guys sound anything like Dog Problems; their jittery uniqueness isn't a bad thing at all. These guys might be something to keep an eye on. While we wait for fests like CMJ to notice them, we'll scratch our heads and try and dechipher what exactly "When I stencil on your brain, it brings surprises" means. -joe puglisi

And a link...

http://www.baeblemusic.com/baebleBlog.aspx?bid=1087

Also we're playing the Phoenix New Times Summer of Sound Rock Show, which we're very excited about...

 There's a flyer on our page, which keeps showing up as broken in the blog....otherwise, I'd post it here

ok, so like...

the phoenix new times reviewed cardiac party r cacti yard pa

Here it is...

"It's no small source of stupid pride for me that there are a million cool anagrams for my name, everything from Mr. Iodine Scene to I Sneer Demonic to No Dicier Semen. Any one of these would make a natty album title. But apparently, it's equally no small source of stupid pride for Cardiac Party that their name does not translate into any desirable anagrams, yet they insist on using one for an album title anyway (ignoring even better alternatives than the one they used, like "cry at acid rap," fer instance). Disgruntled Junior Jumblers aside, you can't dismiss R Cacti Yard, PA for not being well-thought-out obversion, the kind R.E.M. used to practice when they'd make an album cover out of the corner of a candy wrapper. They merge sparse kinetics with an odd fascination for polyphonic Moog sounds and hysterical caterwauling that gives them their "melodramatic popular song" sound. Take a track like "In Yr Inner Industry," which starts off as an atmospheric instrumental, meshing into pleasant folk sounds, and eventually reaches a feverish pitch, with the entire cast blowing on kazoos and barking. All this would be totally meaningless if it weren't for a deliberate lyrical obscurity that would make Yes fans drool. Who among us hasn't said "Oligarchic, given to temper" and then immediately followed it up with "I've got gauze that I bought in December"?

So I should clarify that our album is actually called "Cardiac Party R Cacti Yard, PA" Not "R Cacti Yard, PA". It's because 3 of us are from Pennsylvania, and there are two huge saguaro cacti in our front yard. We are northeast. We are southwest. See, it's not ENTIRELY meaningless.

And thanks to everyone who was at last night's cd release. Everyone awesomed out. HARD!