Dengue Fever – Escape
From Dragon House (CD)
Sound: B Music:
B
When I saw the cover of Dengue Fever’s album Escape
From Dragon House (2005), with lead singer Chhom Nimol in something like a
beehive hairdo with a blue vinyl record album in the background, all I could
think of was The B-52s. Little did I
know that the album would offer the spirit of their music and more. Though they are a six-member band from Los
Angeles doing Cambodian music in part, they cover many more areas and the fact
that most of the lyrics are in Khmer only make the great arrangements’ retro
fell all the more distinct.
Mind you, there are many 1960s styles, from old keyboards
to the Surf music style and other underused dynamics of that era’s pop that
deserve to come back. Like Garbage,
many of the musicians come from solid previous studio work, but something still
different than you have heard before that is more than mere pastiche. The songs here are:
1) We Were
Gonna
2) Sui Bong
3) Tip My
Canoe
4) Tap
Waiter
5) Sleepwalking
Through The Mekong
6) One
Thousand Tears Of the Tarantula
7) Escape
From Dragon House
8) Made Of
Steam
9) Lake
Dolores
10) Saran Wrap
11) Hummingbird
They should get a prize just for having such great titles,
let alone really impressive music. It
is danceable, but also often about something and not repetitious
throughout. It is often so interesting
and clever that you will want to listen to it a few times. The spirit of the best side of New wave with
some guts from the Punk aesthetic really give this an extra boost of power and
quality we have heard from few albums in a while. As a matter of fact, I would not be surprised if this band took
off from out of nowhere and any of these songs could do it.
The PCM 16Bit/44.1kHz 2.0 Stereo is nicely recorded, with
some thorough engineering that further adds to the authentic sound the music
reaches back for, in a way that is more than on par with The Raveonettes. I wanted this disc to have SACD tracks so
badly. Escape From Dragon House
brings back a sense of fun missing in most music releases this year, regardless
of genre, and they have got several of those covered. Catch it!
- Nicholas Sheffo
