Xploding Plastix - The Donca Matic Singalongs

×

Xploding Plastix - The Donca Matic Singalongs

Close

'The Donca Matic Singalongs' is Xploding Plastix's second long-player since their 'Amateur Girlfriends Go Proskirt Agents' CD, and, frankly, the band had a monumental task in living up to or surpassing the sultry menage a trois of spy-jazz fingerstrokes, sweaty cinematics, and head-throbbing breakbeat breakouts found on their 2001 debut. While this latest release is an all-around solid album, the band has both trumped the sensuality and volatility of its earlier outing and come up short at the same time.

Let's begin with the positives. The arousing urban noir of Xploding Plastix's 'Amateur Girlfriends Go Proskirt Agents' is back with a vengeance, albeit on fewer tracks. For example, slightly dark and surfy guitars and a rollicking drumbeat slather 'Geigerteller' in camp and mystery, while the bass-heavy 'Tripwire' reels like a stormy ocean or untamed hips while what sounds like a kettle drum rumbles through the track. The obvious keeper, though, is 'The Famous Biting Guy'. It starts out innocuously enough with a solitary piano, but then it erupts as if a marching band bumrushed the studio - brassy, energetic, and loud. If you've seen the old TV show 'The Prisoner', imagine the closing theme but with synthesizer and more on the side of celebration than on escape. Buy 'The Donca Matic Singalongs' for this track.

Where Xploding Plastix get a little off-track is when they aim for pure electronic melody and collage. Their tracks are still good, but they just aren't distinctive enough to stand out. 'Dizzy Blonde', with its cartoonish, whimsical feel, would make a great soundtrack for a kid's video game in Japan, but it's overshadowed by the disc's jazzier selections. 'The Cave In Proper' sounds like it could have come from any number of bands on the Warp label's roster. Finally, the mix of breakbeat overload and digitally sweet washes on 'One Bullet Fits All' makes for a tuneful and hectic song, but it still doesn't quite satisfy.

The issue is one of comparison; while these latter tracks would warrant unquestioning praise if they were in almost anyone else's catalog, they aren't as explosive or gripping as those in which Xploding Plastix invoke the demons of John Barry, Jack Trombey, or Piero Piccioni at their swarthiest. First-timers should first purchase 'Amateur Girlfriends Go Proskirt Agents' - right away - and experience what all the fuss is about. If they like what they hear, they, and longtime fans, should check out 'The Donca Matic Singalongs'. You'll be sure to enjoy it; just don't listen to the CD expecting a sequel. -sonomu.net

×

Xploding Plastix - The Donca Matic Singalongs

Close