Subcircus – Carousel – Review

Subcircus

(Dreamworks)
by Jamie Kiffel

I saw a little boy eating a Fudgesicle. The thing was dark and slick and he was biting off chunks of it as he walked. He came closer, and grinned. I realized suddenly that he was not eating an ice cream pop at all. My reality-sphere came unglued and rolled swiftly out my ear. The boy was munching a fat slab of beef on a stick.

Subcircus, a British-Danish psycho-pop foursome, also resonate misplaced realities. Their buzzing vocals, lunar echo effects and off-center lyrics seem to be fed through a rotating scope of jellyfish glass. Singer Peter Bradley Jr. shouts like a human kazoo played symphonically, enunciating and elongating such emotive language as “Time is a cockroach caught inside a traveling balloon.” These words are sung with such convincing bravado that I questioned and requestioned my perception, assuming that there must be a train of thought buried here somewhere. The train, however, is way off its track and gleaming colors only exist outside the spectrum. The tunes are demandingly singable (and what boy could resist the opportunity to belt out, “Baby, let’s share eyeliner?”). Virgos rise, circuses have bones, and we’re “over our age” in these insanity-laced capsules of aural anti-square prescription. Firmly fixed on grounds of uncertainty, Subcircus is an inviting trip into Neverland.
(9268 W. 3rd St. Beverly Hills, CA 90210)