Lip Critic Break Down Their Debut Album Hex Dealer Track by Track: Exclusive
The post Lip Critic Break Down Their Debut Album Hex Dealer Track by Track: Exclusive appeared first on Consequence.
Track by Track is our recurring feature series in which artists guide readers through each song on a release. Today, our May CoSign Lip Critic break down their explosive debut album, Hex Dealer.
It’s a major introductory point for Lip Critic, but bears repeating: How many punk bands have two drummers, no guitarists, and sound like they’re crafting one long, explosive, overwhelming electro-seance? Pretty much none, so Lip Critic have emerged with a sound that feels brand new.
The NYC-based electro-punk quartet — who is also our May CoSign — have a proclivity for high drama and surreal humor. Their music is supercharged, but also deeply weird; look no further than “In the Wawa (Convinced That I Am God),” which takes the pedestrian circumstance of ordering a sandwich at a Wawa and presents it like a pulsating fever dream.
Even the band’s responses for this Track by Track breakdown feel straight out of a long-lost dystopian fantasy series — take a gander and you’ll find mentions of cults, pranks, “Building a city out of Subway bread,” robbing a butcher’s shop (in the song “Bork Pelly”), and messing around with “farm animal DNA.” It may seem all over the place for this group of young, restless musicians, but given the confidence, novelty, and aesthetic unity of their sound, they’re no strangers to embracing chaos.
Their influences range from Slipknot and Andy Kaufman to Deerhoof and Death Grips, to video games and Soul Coughing, and a myriad of other left-field choices. They all enjoy similarly eclectic touchstones, but vocalist Bret Kaser is a huge reason these songs take such surrealist shapes.
“There’s this line that runs through all of [the songs], of absurdity and kind of depravity,” Kaser tells Consequence. “A lot of it is me pressing record and doing fully improvised runs over songs, then going back and editing the improv… there’s a lot of Monty Python-style thinking.”
Hex Dealer certainly features a loose through-line narrative, but even taking in the tracks on their own is a feat of imagination. Yes, Lip Critic are a lot, but it comes across as fearless generosity.
Stream Hex Dealer below, and read on for Lip Critic’s Track by Track breakdown.
“It’s the Magic”:
This track is meant to be a kind of a bird’s eye view of the record as a whole. The whole record is about a character fighting off delusions and trying to remember who they are and what they’ve done.
“Love Will Redeem You”:
This song is a cult manifesto, and about not wanting to disappoint people. I was really into the idea of doing backmasking on this one.
“The Heart”:
“The Heart” is about a feeling of frenzy and excitement that overpowers a character’s better judgement.
“Bork Pelly (feat. Ghösh, ID.Sus)”:
This song was us trying to make a posse cut with some of our favorite producers/musicians. It’s about robbing a butcher’s shop in order to do a prank.
“Spirit Bomber”:
This song is about feeling like your spirit is so vibrant and powerful it will eventually explode like a bomb. This has some of my favorite sample/drum processing on the record.
“Death Lurking (feat. Izzy Da Fonseca)”:
A song about trying to run away from death but eventually letting him live with you in your apartment. Also about building a city out of subway bread.
“Milky Max”:
A pop song about experimenting with farm animal DNA. The main synth riff for this was sitting in my laptop for years.
“Sermon”:
This song is a sermon given by a faith healer flickering between multiple personalities.
“I’m Alive”:
“I’m Alive” is about recognizing you are in fact alive after a series of horrible situations.
“My Wife and the Goblin”:
This song is about hallucinating that everyone in your life is turning on you.
“In the Wawa (Convinced That I Am God)”:
This song is about giving in to delusions and not caring about reality.
“Toxin Dodger”:
This song is an encore to the record, it’s intended to sort of end after “In The Wawa,” but we don’t wanna leave you on a low note.
Lip Critic Break Down Their Debut Album Hex Dealer Track by Track: Exclusive
Paolo Ragusa
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