Too much sugar-punk will make you fat...
Steriogram’s choice of Michel Gondry as director of the video clip for their debut single ‘Walkie Talkie Man’ immediately wins the band brownie points. Gondry, being the man responsible for ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ and master of imaginative music videos like The Chemical Brothers’ ‘Let Forever Be’ and The White Stripes’ ‘Fell In Love With A Girl,’ delivers, yet again, a gem of technical brilliance and creative genius for the band’s visual promo.
The single starts with a riff very similar to Green Day’s ‘Warning’ and then goes into a rap reminiscent of the ’79 classic ‘Rapper’s Delight’ by Sugar Hill Gang. The formula is the pop-punk equivalent of Faith No More’s typical song structure with particular reference to ‘Epic.’ The lyrics have little substance, but fun’s the meaning of the music and for those seeking head-shaking kicks and major scale power chords, this is where it’s at.
The title track ‘Schmack!’ hits you with a sugary punch of Custom-style rap and a sweetly sung chorus that Good Charlotte would be envious of. However, the music of Steriogram incorporates so many elements of different styles, which actually update the aged sound of pop-punk and truly brings an originality to this band, an attribute which so many others in the genre profess but fail to deliver.
The originality of the track titles, however, is debatable, what with ‘Tsunami,’ (Manics) ‘Wind It Up,’ (Prodigy) and ‘Go’ (Blink.) ‘Go’ is a vocally robust song, Foo Fighters meet Sugarcult, get drunk, and produce a rampant, scatty, bubblegum hit. ‘Fat And Proud’ affirms the band’s obsession with obesity, (‘Walkie Talkie Man’s’ fat man lyrics providing the first indication) enabling them to join the ranks of the kings of podge, NOFX. The verse lyrics are rapped Beastie Boys style, whereas the lyrics to ‘Wind It Up’ are rapped more in the tradition of Eminem.
The formula, present on every song so far, doesn’t show any signs of letting up and just as you begin to feel you may be getting bored of the over-abundance of fast, silly words and happy-scale riffs, ‘Be Good To Me’ comes on. The penultimate tune is a slow, acoustic, melodious pop song with the lyric ‘A boy in a Bon Jovi world,’ it’s cute. The singing is soulful and typical, in sound, of most modern-day, male-led pop, yet the rap’s still there, but providing a nice under-current on this song.
It ends with ‘On And On’ which may be one synthetic audio track too many, it reverts back to the usual swing of things after ‘Be Good To Me’ and, although there’s a few insightful lyrics, it possibly a bit too much, unnecessary. As Steriogram know all too well, I’m sure, too much sugary pop-punk will make you fat…