Captain Comatose
Up In Flames
Playhouse
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Overhearing a Captain Comatose track from a passing car, you might be tempted to dismiss it as just another sexed-up electro-rock cut. But Up In Flames, the playful work of veteran hedonists Khan and Snax, is hardly so simplistic. Though the duo acknowledges a cheeky reverence for the '70s rock-dates-disco phase, the nostalgia stops there. "Poppertalk Blues" offers the figurative sound of amyl nitrate, complete with warped blues guitar and druggy mumbles, while "To My Song," turns to the '60s for a summertime anthem melding pumping pianos with garage-blues vocals over rolling drums (are those timpanis?); in the background, a synthesizer zippers like a kitten sliding down the curtains. It's a guaranteed hit for places like Frankfurt's Robert Johnson and New York's APT, but in a perfect world, it'd be blaring out of car windows. (CJN)