cAge - In Stereo

Alternative Press

"Cage scream in twisted heaves, lurching musically from soft-to-homespun-to-dissonant, with howling moans, broken bottles created by keyboards, and heartbleats made of bass guitar. Their softness is pure tension. Their hardness is an arty sledgehammer to the ear. Thanks to their combination of megaphone distorted vocals, angelic la-la-las and a herky jerky pulse, Cage most remind me of a 1987 band called Jackdaw With Crowbar, whose similarly funky avant rock was schizophrenically manic and bizzare. Imagine early Pere Ubu looking in the mirror to find latter-day Pere Ubu in a funhouse owned by 100 Flowers. Truly psychadelic if not psyco-delic." -Andrea Enthal GAJOOB - "This comes from an Ohio-based band, formerly called The Raging Mantras who reformed into Cage when former drummer Jim Macpherson joined the Breeders for a European tour and accepted their invitation to join the band. New drummer Matt Espy, along with singer-songwriter Gregg Spence joined in and the rest is documented here, spending just a Summer to come up with a very tight set of college-rock songs with plenty of strange twists thrown in to keep things fun and on the edge. This is very fast-paced, starting off with straight-forward guitar-rock hooks and then tilting left-of-center, with its right-on megaphone vocal verse. Recommended.

Intensity

"Smashing, rip-roaring, it's genre-splicing in a simplistic way. Cage are a twisted bunch of Ohio musicians who will either please you (as in "Household Finance", dedicated to televangilists) or irritate you to no end ("8 Day Drunk", which mixes Sonic Youth-style power chords with a keyboard that sounds like a xylophone). The diverse range of styles in each song kept my attention to this record throughout, especially in "Worst Case Scenario", which bounced back from forcefull lyrics full of anger and sarcasm ("I want a buck for every tear that I lost/oh Mr. No One's Home, oh Mr. Money Man/I'll cut you a deal on a left-of-center midwest sound") to pretty choruses of la la las."

Chairs Missing

"You see an old friend of the opposite sex walking down the street towards you. You say 'hi' to him/her. He/she responds by french kissing and performing oral sex on you in broad daylight, then proceeds to take your wallet/purse and beat the shit out of you. That accurately describes Cage. With a sound approaching The Pixies on acid doing early (good) Butthole Surfers, it's a great concoction of insane rock like The Wallmen or Big Flame. Great stuff."

Moe Magazine

"'Plod' is really more of a mid-tempo number with jarring guitar lines and a real build-up of tension. Of the four songs, the one that drew me in the most was 'Worst Case Scenario' with it's obscured megaphone singing and sweet la la la chorus as counterpoint to the harsh instrumental work. All four songs share a twisting reinterpretation of conventional song structure and yet remain captivating and entertaining." -Jim Visser

Everybody's News

"Cage's "In Stereo" is a four-song EP with sounds that shift from thick yet catchy riffs into angst-ridden, megaphone-backed overdrives. The EP's highpoint would have to be 'Worst Case Scenario' with it's la la la chorus followed by larynx-wrenching screams. Crunching and unpredictable to say the least, yet quite original and enjoyable."

Friction

"Even hearing their single in advance did not prepare me for the experience... go buy their record and see them every chance you get..." EAR OF CORN - "Fucking hell! This band is great! Amazing songwriting is going on here. With about a billion changes, twists and turns per song, this four song ep packs more in it than most full-length albums do. The amazing thing of it all is that it fits together just right. Very original. I guess if you need comparisons, I'd say there are aspects of The Trouble With Larry, Butthole Surfers, maybe the Jesus Lizard. Aw Christ, I don't know, this is just a cool record."

Real Life in a Big City

"Brash artistic stuff. The vocals are roughly half straight forward melodic delivery and half screamed or augmented by megaphone. Lots of changes in tempo and/or level of eardrum damage infliction. My fave is a heavy sixties-ish 8-bar rocker with the only lyrics being 'Eight day drunk'."

Shoelace

"Definately one of the better things to come in here at SHOELACE. Some megaphone vocals along with some melodic gut rock... Go listen to "8 Day Drunk" in the woods late at night."

FOE

"Rulin' tunes, sarcastic (cool) lyrics, good songwriting, keeps the interest. Kinda Polvo meets Surgery or something. Put some beef behind this and I'm breaking stuff."

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