Made In America - CANCERS, "Fatten The Leeches" (2014)

I'm a little late to the game in coming across the debut album Fatten The Leeches from the Athens, Georgia based duo Cancers. As soon as I clicked on the opening track "Be Cool" I was immediately transported back to my teenage years. On the cusp of graduating high school, long dark brown hair hiding a pimpled face, I was moving out of my "metal only" phase and beginning to open my ears up to a burgeoning grunge scene while falling in love with college rock that was transitioning into 90's alternative. 

What I loved most about 90's alternative were the introduction of more melodic choruses and catchy-as-hell hooks over crunchy guitars. It was hard-edged but welcoming at the same time.

Members Ella Kaspar and Lenny Millar are able to create a fat and filling sound with just the two of them with Kaspar's vocals adding an extra sweetness to their sound in a way that Kristin Herch did with Throwing Muses or Kay Hanley did with Letters To Cleo. What separates Cancers from the aforementioned is that they deliver the sweetness with a crunchier outer shell.

Made In America - Shark?

At least a couple of times a week I’ll spend a few hours at night trolling the depths of the internet for new music. This both alleviates occasional boredom and feeds my obsession for ear candy. I like to think that I have a pretty good finger on the pulse of what’s out there but in all reality I don’t, not even close, and more often than not, I’ll miss out on a band with some worthy tunes. One of those bands was Brooklyn, New York’s, Shark?

I caught Shark?, yep, pun intended, as one of the two openers for post-punk icons Mission Of Burma a couple of weeks ago at The Earl in Atlanta, Georgia. They were at the tail end of a small tour with a stop through Austin at South By Southwest on their way back home. I must admit that they didn’t get to me at first. Even now I wouldn’t be able to pick out the opening song from a playlist. I only remember that it was a somewhat mono-drone, fuzzy experience and I could even be wrong about that. It was probably as awesome as the rest of the set ended up being. 

Frontman Kevin Diamond knows how to write a song with a head-bobbing groove and a hook that will land the dourest of listeners. I know, the fishing puns, can’t stop, won’t stop. While inching my way towards the front of the stage I invisioned Shark? as a rock and roll love child between The Pixies and The Strokes who received the choicest DNA from both bands. 

 

But the song that did it for me and has been on constant repeat for the last two weeks is the song Shark?, from their 2012 album True Waste. The song was the set closer and it closed the deal for me. I immediately darted for the merch table and netted a copy of the album, on cassette no less. Thankfully there was a digital download card.

So enhance your life a little and check out “You Don’t Love Me Anymore”, fall in love with this band like I did, and then listen to their latest single “California Grrls” from their upcoming album Savior on Old Flame Records, expected to be released sometime this summer.

Here's a link to Shark?s latest single "California Girls" via Soundcloud.
More Shark? music available for a listen on their Bandcamp page.