Reviews

First off, any band that names a song after a “Mystery Science Theater 3000” reference has a place in my memory. The first song on the debut EP by Michigan’s The Reptilian, “I’ll Ram My Ovipositor Down Your Throat and Lay My Eggs in Your Chest, But I’m Not an Alien!” is from a line in the MST3K movie. The song itself gets off to an interesting start with a nice instrumental intro that shows that the bands ability to use melody. The vocals of Jon Sacha are real jumpy, but they work in terms of the music, which twists and turns at every possible angle. Near the end of the song, the band jumps on an entirely different train, going in a funky angle with some excellent guitar work sprinkled over it.

The band is scattered all over the musical map, but that’s a good thing because they’re bringing in some originality. While the lyrics are read aloud like free-form poetry, they tend to make some sort of sense along with the music. This is the clearest on “So…What are My Torso Options?” where everything flows together to create one of the most interesting songs of the year.

Unfortunately, not everything works on the record; for instance, the three-minute sound collage, “Wallkicks will Work” simply doesn’t go anywhere at all. On the other hand, the record’s closer “I Can’t Drink This, It’s Warm!” looks to be going down the same road until about halfway through, when the band realizes what it wants to do and goes for the jugular, just fast and quick. That’s when the song reaches its full potential. Ultimately, that’s the full peak of the song and it just goes rapidly downhill from there, just never able to reach its apex again.

In the end, the record is an excellent start for the band and it’ll be interesting to see where they’re able to go from here.