On Hot Panda's new release How Come I'm Dead?, the Edmonton-based foursome experiment with a variety of sounds and musical genres, incorporating pop, hip hop, rock and dance influences.
Sonic Experimentation
How Come I'm Dead contains few dull musical moments. "Masculinity" combines horns with frenzied guitars and plenty of digital blips and bits, while "Ghost" mixes pop melodies with aggressive riffs and singer Chris Connelly's unpredictable vocals, which alternate between ominous and joyful in the course of a single verse. "Evil Nature" mines similar territory, combining silky smooth vocals with dark, distorted guitar riffs that cut like serrated knives.
"Hell Hey Hex" contains more sonic anarchy, with its woozy guitars, hip hop-inspired scratching and a heavy synthesized bass that digs itself into your ear canal. The track abruptly changes tempo as well, transforming form laid back, mid-tempo groove into a high speed, punk rock freak out. The trick doesn't always work though. The eerie, organ-driven "Mindlessness" starts out as a fun, fast track before losing steam midway through.
"Start Making Sense," chocked full of bouncy, angular guitars and sharp drums embraces a more conventional pop/rock sound, while the mournful chords, staccato riffs and three part harmonies of "Shoot Your Horse" would fit in perfectly on a Johnny Cash album. Lest the listener get too comfortable, a blazing, chaotic solo cuts through the quiet, making sure the album stays on its whacked out path.
What Are They Saying? Who Cares!
While Hot Panda provide a smorgasbord of sounds on How Come I'm Dead?, the lyrics are treated like an afterthought. The words are often intelligible or are too vague to glean anything from. "Poor Little Ambulance" contains a few phrases about--what else?-- a little ambulance before the music takes over the rest of the track. "1995" makes the best stab at storytelling, reminiscing about school days and "talking about music, art and stuff."
"I can't grow a beard/But I'm learnin' to act like a man," Connelly barks in "Masculinity." Is he critiquing the system of patriarchy that requires men and women to act specific, socially-assigned gender roles? Who knows. But maybe that's the point. Hot Panda wants to get the party started, not be profound.
"All you forward thinking people all think alike/Need to see things more black and white," Connelly lectures in "Clever Fox." Hot Panda aren't concerned with being taken too seriously. So why should they be? Take How Come I'm Dead? for what it is--a loud, obnoxious good time.
Kevin Neil - Kevin Neil is a freelance writer and a graduate of Northwestern State University, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in ...
