"ELMO'S WISH" AND "THESE ANIMAL MENSWE@R": EACH WORTH $0.99

Gil Mantera and Ultimate Donny: I don't know why I love you.

Earlier this week I posted a blog about the Art Brut concert and mentioned their opening act, Gil Mantera's Party Dream. Today I'm blogging a song from both bands. I recommend BUYING both of them.

Gil Mantera's Party Band "Elmo's Wish"

GMPB is a pair of brothers, Gil Mantera and Ultimate Donny, from Youngstown, Ohio that play a form of pop music that sounds like a hybrid between Andrew W.K. and M83. The band hasn't ever released a single, but they do have a video for "Elmo's Wish" and I think it's the best thing on their new album, Bloodsongs. The song opens with an unsettling minor-key synthesizer loop that then repeats throughout the song. The beat kicks in and Ultimate Donny belts out a less-than-meets-the-eye verse tinged with existential anxiety. Gil Mantera sings the lilting, rushed chorus through a vocoder: "I don't know why I love you!" This is a thoroughly post-modern affair: the music treads familiar 80's sounds but tweaks them to make you feel uncomfortable and unsure. Ultimate Donny's lyrics utilize cliches then subvert their meaning by turning to nonsense. My favorite moment, sung with Steve Perry's desperation: She walked in through the front door/Without a clue what she's there for/She walked out with a shotgun/Wrong decision/Let's hope she made the right one.

Art Brut "These Animal Menswe@r"

This track has been around for a while and is now officially released on the Modern Art/My Little Brother EP. The song opens right into the story of a beleaguered boy whose presence elicits hatred and violence in his peers, and Argos gives it a supremely warm and cheerful delivery. By the time you get to the chorus and the ooh-wah-ooh back-up singers, it's clear that this is a different kind of Art Brut track (re: melodic, but not too much, maybe that's not new but it sure sounds like it). "These Animal Menswe@ar" has been stuck in my head for weeks now.