PURGATORY DANCE PARTY

It's amazing to finally see Polkadot Cadaver on PA! Both Todd Smith and Jasan Stepp are considered the Godfathers of Avant-Garde Metal, a genre they developed by taking ideas from experimental metal of Mr. Bungle and pushing it to its extreme with the six Dog Fashion Disco releases, between 1996 and 2007. The band went as far as they possibly could with their material and the release of their final studio album Adultery showed a perfection of the genre that just couldn't be topped within the existing lineup. This was when Smith and Stepp dissolved the band and went on to do more studio experiments on their own.

With the help of past Dog Fashion Disco collaborators John Ensminger and Matt Rippetoe, the new project started somewhat as a joke where the duo basically brainstormed though all the different things that they wanted to try out on a record an then mixed it into what became Purgatory Dance Party. One clear diversion from the previous sound of Dog Fashion Disco is the addition of two acoustic tracks Haunted Holiday and Chloroform Girl which might seem all sweet and innocent until you start uncovering their lyrical content!

We also get additional electronic arrangements, most prominent on Purgatory Dance Party and Bring Me The Head Of Andy Warhol, and what can only be considered a homage to Slayer on the intro of What's The Worst Thing That Could Happen?. The contrasts between the compositions are pretty extreme but somehow it manages to work perfectly as a whole entity. I honestly can't pick a single track that I would consider being out of place on this release!

I've been listening pretty much non-stop to Purgatory Dance Party after discovering it in early March 2011 and my favorite compositions have shifted back and forth. Still, if I had to pick the tracks that just never seize to amaze me then it would be Bring Me The Head Of Andy Warhol and Pure Bedlam For Halfbreeds. These two compositions cover a lot of mileage over the course of their relatively short playtime. I can describe Bring Me The Head Of Andy Warhol as an acid trip gone bad. Ever new twist and turn of the composition makes the music sound more sinister than before and the transition to Chloroform Girl is completely epic!

Other great moments here are the upbeat Long Strange Trip To Paradise and What's The Worst Thing That Could Happen? which always manage to pump me up with energy, while Sole Survivor is just a perfect concluding track that ties the record neatly into a bundle and hands it over to you and make the listener hit that repeat button and experience the whole album "over and over and over again"!!!

I really want to shout from the rooftops about how much I love Purgatory Dance Party, but frightened by the fact that long review discourage people from reading all the way though, allow me to tie the knot here by simply stating --- experience this album!!!

***** star songs: Haunted Holiday (2:01) A Wolf In Jesus Skin (3:50) Long Strange Trip To Paradise (2:36) Bring Me The Head Of Andy Warhol (3:26) What's The Worst Thing That Could Happen? (4:32) Pure Bedlam For Halfbreeds (3:04) Sole Survivor (4:34)

**** star songs: Purgatory Dance Party (4:08) Deathwish (3:36) Phantom Limb (3:19) Chloroform Girl (2:56) Brainwash (3:54)