Bikini Death Race – Party Animals

Bikini Death Race - Party Animals

Album facts

Release: April 23rd, 2018
Label: Ghost Factory Records
Genre: , ,
Discogs: Link

Buckle up, bitch!

The debut album 'Party Animals' by 'Bikini Death Race' is a raid through the candy shop of elec­tron­ic music and a homage to all this funny world's stu­pid first world prob­lems.

The guy with the panda mask (nope, not ger­man 'CRO', thank good­ness) and the girl with the cat mask is not a fever­ish dream of a 12-year-old. It´s 'Bikini Death Race' foun­ded in September 2016 inside a toi­let in Rome. I mean, can it get even more surreal?!

Well, yes. Look what their promo says about their album: "Choosing idiocy as psy­cho­ther­apy and dada­ism as their philo­sophy on life, the songs on the album sym­bol­ize an exor­cism for Bikini Death Race: a driv­ing out of sense­less­ness through senselessness!".

Hear, hear. And now: Gentlepandas and Catladies – start your engines!

Lap 1: Full Force

The open­er 'Celestico' is an 8‑bit-Fun-Electro-Clash rat race through all the crazi­ness fash­ion, its vic­tims and its self-appoin­ted judges hold for us. It com­bines the easy sing-along of a children's song with Alice-in-Wonderland-like storytelling. Great song for a good old round of 'Musical Chairs'!

'The Rabbit Hole' keeps up the speed and rushes us on into this stu­pid moment when you stare in a face and you know, you should know it. But you don't. Happens to me all the time. The arrange­ment catches this emo­tion­al state per­fectly: first, you get a little hec­tic, illus­trated by sounds like a Jump and Run game and then this moment when you try to slow down your thoughts to get a grip and scan­ning, scan­ning. But there is noth­ing to scan. All you find here is a fast little earworm!

Bikini Death Race
Bikini Death Race – Promo pic­ture 2018

Lap 2: Getting tactic

Phew, a short break for breath­ing with 'Zombie Posers'. This one already sounds a bit dark­er, using clas­sic Batcave rhythms and synths resem­bling a spin­et. But 'Bikini Death Race' will nev­er let you down when it comes to a catchy chor­us with which the 'Zombie Posers' all around us don't look as fright­en­ing anymore.

'OhOoh' could be inter­preted as the essence of a worst case scen­ario bitch party. I'm not say­ing girls' party because that's some­thing else. The tunes con­trast­ing this scene are very well played: they appear so sug­ary sweet you might get a toothache on the spot.

Don't talk just kiss me
Lyrics from 'Don't Talk' by Bikini Death Race

At first this line from 'Don't Talk' might sound prom­ising, lusty and some­what hot. It's not. Well, no, actu­ally it is. Wait. Exactly this awk­ward feel­ing is depic­ted in lyr­ics and music­al arrange­ment. In all these big wal­low­ing waves of synths you sense des­per­a­tion, the throb­bing of blood inside your body but at the same time a slimy apathy. All this wrapped in a slow disco beat trans­fers you to the per­fect set­ting for this song: a dingy semi-dark disco, pretty late and with a sticky floor.

Lap 3: Fuck, they're catching up!

'Party Animals' is pick­ing up speed again but not as gaily col­oured as at the begin­ning of this record. This party night has a bit­ter taste but it's fun nev­er­the­less. You keep on jump­ing around to this party track although you already know you´re going to die from hangover tomorrow.

When you speak it's like nails down a blackboard.
Did you know that your breath makes me cry?
Lyrics from 'Fuck Off And Die' by Bikini Death Race

'Fuck Off And Die' is dom­in­ated by an almost clas­sic goth­ic crooked tinny gui­tar which pic­tures empti­ness like noth­ing else. With pleas­ure, I notice the dirty scream­ing near the end of the song – a per­fect con­trast to the oth­er­wise very clean sound. A big, strained middle fin­ger against the stead­ily 'self-per­fec­tion­ing' and over judging Übermenschen around us.

If I had had 'Not Sorry' when I was a teen­ager it would def­in­itely have been my per­son­al entry song to every place at every time. Nothing rep­res­ents the stu­pid crap we do every day so light­headed and play­ful as this song. With a 70ies psy­che­del­ic sound wave, sug­ar-pop-didelidi and a good old 'HEY HEY' and 'WOOHOO' this piece should enter every dance­floor sat­ur­ated with a cer­tain alco­hol level.

Into this crazy par­typ­a­looza 'Have You Ever' blends without actu­ally me noti­cing. It's 8‑bit-aes­thet­ics mixed with lightly skip­ping beats thwart the bliss­fully hate­ful lines

So, why don’t you? (break your fuck­ing face with something)
Lyrics from 'Have You Ever' by Bikini Death Race

Party on and hate a bit, it's real fun!

'Time Machine' is a some­how sad but driv­ing sci-fi scenery sur­round­ing a time machine with no mean­ing because the girl with the cat mask can't find time to use it. The song hits off with a dull 'dum­dum' base, the 80ies space gui­tar and synths are sup­por­ted by aero­grammes in the back­ground and a lofty, sort of lost melody line. It's pretty clev­er to close the record with a song centred around regret because this is what often fol­lows a wild, got­ten-out-of-hand party.

Finish

This party-able mix­ture of 'Ladytron' and 'Chicks On Speed' com­bines social cri­ti­cism with a lot of cot­ton candy, merry-go-round and Alice in Wonderland. It nev­er lacks authen­ti­city in lyr­ics and nev­er misses a catchy punch­line. To me it doesn't feel like sense­less­ness, it feels like hack­ing down every­day frus­tra­tion to some­thing that's actu­ally digest­ible enough to laugh about and dance on it. Big love, Catlady and Pandaguy!

Track By Track Rating

Bikini Death Race - Party Animals
Bikini Death Race – Party Animals
Celestico
The Rabbit Hole
Zombie Posers
Oh Ooh
Don't Talk
Party Animals
Fuck Off And Die 
Not Sorry
Have You Ever?
Time Machine
Recommend
Celestico
Don't Talk
Not Sorry
Time Machine
Weak
(Nothing to report here)
3.6
Party on!

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Celestico
The Rabbit Hole
Zombie Posers
Oh Ooh
Don't Talk
Party Animals
Fuck Off And Die
Not Sorry
Have You Ever?
Time Machine
Final Score