Let's Go

It’s approximately 36 hours before this thing goes all the way live. “Situation Critical,” as Platinum Blonde once said (and if you’re not up on Platinum Blonde, let’s just say they were Canada’s answer to Duran Duran back in the ’80s, and their first two albums are the kinds of guilty pleasures that in a singular, inimitable way are sort of amazing). My nervous system is fried from too many Extreme Mocha Lights from the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf across the way (hi Alie). It’s late and I can’t sleep. What’s a boy to do? Oh right, cozy up to a nice pile of vintage vinyl.

Which is where I unearthed this amazing feat of sonic dexterity, the second album from the Cars, “Candy-O.”  Originally released in 1979(!), this album puts 99.9% of these current skinny-legged indie bands trying so desperately to make you dance with their angular guitars and discofied beats to shame. The Strokes even tried to write a Cars song with “12:51.” These dudes (from Boston, people) were waaaaaay ahead of their time, like light years. Not only were they quirky as all get out, but also wrote catchy songs that slaughtered FM radio and they rocked – hard. Hard enough that stoners cruising the strip in T-topped Cameros would blast singles like “Let’s Go” and the title track with pride.

So if you’re feeling particularly neon and maybe a little elegantly wasted, and your boy snatched your Klaxons EP (again), just nab yourself a copy of “Candy-O.” Blast this in front of Cinespace on a Tuesday night and all the cool girls will want you to take them for a spin. 

"You go dancing in the dim lit club/some pressure cooker crawls up on his knees/flashing sensation like a one on one/stomping around in the jitterbug breeze/oo how you shake me up and down/when we hit the nightspots on the town" — "Nightspots"