Perhaps I should share my introduction to their astonishing world. An innocent email found its way to my inbox and I downloaded the albums it referred me to: 2010’s EP and Summer Mixtape. Certainly, non-descript, unassuming titles. We try to listen to everything that comes our way here at YabYum which can be a dangerous policy.
Beginning with March’s EP I was thrown into confusion as the track “Tim Allen” ripped through my car on a peaceful journey. Demented circus music distorts classical scores with Ritalin-generation revenge. The other tracks on the band’s shortplay continue along in the acid-filled spine of a Hunter S. Thompson theme Circus Circus vacation package. Songs like the multifaceted “Simpleton Grin” and the Strawberry Jam-a-liscious “This Colored Workday” demonstrated versatility despite the highly-stylized layers of sound, sometimes borrowed, sometimes new.
By the end of the EP, I was pretty much convinced Caviar & Cigarettes had a good thing going but then, when Summer Mixtape came on, the group went from notable to extraordinary. The mere juxtaposition of the two albums only served their favor. Fucking sick from the vibrant remix of “You Make My Dreams Come True” and the convolution “Heart of Ass,” Summer Mixtape reminds me that my abhorrence of consumerism is superseded always by my love of kitsch.
It’s not necessarily that Summer Mixtape is better than EP it is simply that the two albums when placed side by side reveal a journey of creation that is both perplexing and wonderful, capable of bringing many more deranged views of the world to musical life.
