There’s something inviting and morbid about some of the cartoons we enjoy at the annual Spike and Mike’s Festival of animation or the killer bunny from Monty Python’s “Life of Brian.” On The Dollyrots debut on Panic Button/Lookout! Records, the CD cover displays a Japanese style illustration of a cute bunny, smiling while wielding a knife, fork, and heart on a plate. It’s The Dollyrots’ juxtaposition of sweet and sour that makes this band so inviting.
Kelly Ogden’s lollipop vocals may be sugary as hell, but she doesn’t lack the edge enough to whip Avril Lagvigne over the head with that skateboard the pop diva pretends to ride in her videos. “Feed Me Pet Me” takes me back to the days of ’90s Seattle before Calvin Klein was selling $5 flannel shirts for $200 off the runway, and at a time when Ogden and the clan were still in grade school.
This is a great escape from our own personal trouble and those around us, simplistic in a lyrical sense, taking us in to that era of the ’50s Motown when girly bands made cheery songs overflowing with harmony. But fifty years later, things are bit more “Skinny” and spunky, spiked with more than just some vodka in the school dance punch.
The Dollyrots come to Denver Sunday, September 12 at Cricket On The Hill.
