self-released

“Hot Alien Orgy,” a song from Kicksville’s third album, The Singles – Season 3, encompasses everything the band is. Creepy synth sounds back a fratboyish sounding dude who says, “After this gig, hot alien orgy, my house. I’m gonna get me some alien pussy. I’m a jazzman. I’m a fucking jazzman. Check it out.” As the synth sounds slowly start to form a chord and a beat, his last words, something about an anal probe, are drowned out. Enter a smooth and futuristic sounding female voice and some Frisellian guitar. She’s singing about the aforementioned hot alien orgy, but her tone is almost Enyaesque. Appropriate listener reactions to this track are “Wha?” “Beg pardon?” or perhaps “One of these things is not like the other.” Appropriate listener reactions to the band are “None of these things are like the others.” But very much like the last Magnetic Fields record, Realism, the disparate elements and general weirdness don’t sound forced or contrived. They are effortless displays of eclecticism. Pappa Zappa is smiling up in heaven, right next to the flying spaghetti monster.

With Kicksville, we have characters like Luna, who “loves a good chocky,” and Piggy, who is a fucking jerk. We have characters that are bricks. We have modern, unlyrical poetry. We have poetry that sounds like John Berryman. We have rap. We have metal. We have spacey jams. We have screaming guitars, monster beats, and sick chops. We have a track called “Radiation Emanates from the Box.” No words. Just go listen. Plus there’s just enough of a funky groove to keep the hipsters at bay.

So far Kicksville has 69 members, but with a live band of usually 17. The Mayor is Mike Stehr, and the Commissioner is Conrad St. Clair. All three of their albums feature interconnected stories with some characters migrating from one album to the next. They won’t ever be played on commercial radio, but with the release of Season 3, Kicksville_ makes a grand splash with some odd, funky, thrashy, dope, intricate, experimental music sure to thrill anyone tird of all the worn and frayed forms of popular music.