Call The Cops – Motion Sickness

7 April 2009, Joe @ 7:37 pm Call The Cops Motion Sickness

What do you do when there’s a ruckus of emphatic electronic pop, line after line of clever lyrics and a simple guilty pleasure coming out of your speakers? Call The Cops. This four-piece band from Long Beach, California has created an onslaught of catchy electropop that might just be too good to be legal. With a sound comparable to a mixture of Metro Station and Forever The Sickest Kids, they have a good thing going. I’ve been straying away from bands heavy on the electronics, because often it is overdone and poorly executed. Call The Cops does a good job ridding of this notion with their best weapon, their sequencing. The 6-track EP, Motion Sickness, is a fun compilation of tracks that’s heavy on the synths, drama, and non stop action.

Right from the get go, CTC starts things off on a fast note that never lets up throughout the album. Get Close is a bit different from the other tracks, because there is a heavy emphasis on the synthesized vocals which is not as visible in the rest of the EP. Get Close is a high-paced and high energy track that does a great job of overloading on sequencing, albeit never saturating the quality. I still feel that beneath all the glitz and glamour there is a core group of talented guys, and this is never masked. The vocals, while you can’t hear them au natural in this track, are not bad, and remind me of FTSK. Their back and forth vocal styling of constant lyrical output is something that FTSK does as well. Fused in with the party-jazzed sequencing, similar to Metro Station, you have a band that’s high in energy, and daringly imaginative with their beats.

Room 410, is probably my favourite track because of the pop-driven lyrics put on display. The speedy delivery and ridiculous catchy vocal melody takes things to a whole new level. What’s great about this song is the sheer addictiveness, after repeats of listen I find myself going from humming the beat, to full out serenading the lyrics. The vocals are not sequenced in this track, and again the back and forth pace is a standing trade mark of their sound. I really enjoyed the witty lyrics, though a bit cliché they do put a bit of spin from your average teeny bopper themes. The sequencing is done very modestly, and the emphasis is really put on the vocals which is probably one of their best features. Behind all that, there is still guitar and drum work that seemingly adds extra flare to the high energy performance.

The EP begins with two truly exciting and unique electronic pop-rock tracks. From here on out, the next 3 songs are a bit similar to each other and go off on a more serious tangent. There is still heavy electronic work done, but it does get considerably darker so to speak. They feature a more progressive dance-rock vibe. The songs are still very much catchy in their own right, but it feels like the themes take on glimpses of real feeling and emotion. Motion Sickness uses a bit more of the synthesized vocals; otherwise it has a similar heavy style, with a large emphasis on the guitar and drums.

The EP ends off with a slow jam in Watch Me Make You Hate Me. The melody is stripped of all the extra bells and whistles and the vocals are of a synthetic mellow variety. This track begins to feel like a lot of the electropop bands out there, such as the old school version of A Rocket to the Moon. While it’s a nice change up from the frantic pace that was bestowed in the first 5 tracks, I do hope they don’t attempt the mimic this style on a routine basis. I felt the best part of the album was the two care-free party tracks to start, but I can’t hate on the variety that CTC displays. Their ability to stay clearly within the electropop genre, yet have fast and slow songs, is something to be admired. An EP I thoroughly enjoyed, these guys are a breath of fresh air, in a genre that is threatened by saturated and overdone sequencing.

AWmusic