Shonen Knife

The Birds and the B-Sides (Virgin)
by Joshua Brown

I got no response when I suggested to our Editor that Shonen Knife‘s “Froot Loops Dreams” be the official song of our magazine (“chocorate screams and ice cream dreams/fancy fravors, crouds and sun/lots of cake and soda pop/and rorripops for everyone”). (For those of you who still think NYC Hardcore: The Way It Is is a Bruce Hornsby & the Range tribute album, the letter “I” becomes “R” more often than not in Shonen Knife’s lyrics. It’s a Japanese cuddle-core thing, you wouldn’t understand…) Though Scott’s probably right that “strangulation, mutilation, cancer of the brain” would be a more appropriate Rorripop (there I go again) theme song, there’s something about this adorable all-girl trio that inhibits my reasoning capabilities and makes me scream “I wanna eat chocorate bars!” If you feel the same, this compilation is a “froot roop” dream come true. A lot of the songs are rare and unreleased with some live tracks and covers, including songs by the Carpenters, Phil Spector & Harry Nilsson, and the Kinks.