Joy Zipper...

Joy Zipper put out a nice album about 3 years ago called Joy Zipper on Bar None. It was a good album full of dreamy pop music that had as much in common with the Beach Boys as with bands like Air and Zero 7. The thing I always liked about Joy Zipper was the undercurrent of sinister lyricism. You'd be surfing along on the nicest riff, a bouncy beat, and some sweet boy girl harmonies, nodding your head, before you realized that he was singing about a heartbroken stalker. It took quite awhile for American Whip to reach our shores due to record label hassles. I don't know the whole deal but the album has only been available as a very pricey import (very pricey given the state of the dollar). American Whip is now due for a February 2005 release. To be honest I didn't feel very strongly about their first record. It was nice but it didn't blow me away. Things seem to have been turned up a notch on the new one. The songwriting is excellent, those harmonies shimmer like a hot day at the beach. Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine twiddles the knobs on five of the new tracks and you can really feel that guitar fuzz crawling through the spine of these songs. And still creepy lyrically, not the least because the two primaries in Joy Zipper (Vincent Cafiso and Tabitha Tindale) are partners in both life and music which makes one wonder just who they're singing about on some these songs.

Here's three from American Whip:

Christmas Song

33x

Alzheimers