Atom And His Package
Attention! Blah Blah Blah (Hopeless)
by Ewan Wadharmi
Here’s the tally; Devo: Rock, funny, dormant except movie & TV music. They Might Be Giants: Seldom rock, funny again after a long stretch, active currently in children’s music genre. Dead Milkmen: Sort of rocked, I guess (funny expired 1991, Milkmen expired 1995). That leaves Me First & The Gimme Gimmes as the skipper, and his little buddy Atom & His Package stranded on the geek joke-rock island. The one man behind this band is cool jerk Adam Goren, who not only rocks on a regular basis, but pours out inventive sounds with the glee of a child wielding a new paint set. The corners of the songs are packed with acidic guitar riffs and brightly-colored electronics, which, like Goren’s voice, are often goofy but never annoying. Layers and overlaps of weird synth voices should have electro enthusiasts clamoring to hire out the production talents of Atom or his package, depending on which one is responsible. It’s an endearing idiot-savant-gard experiment so stupid it’s brilliant. Short attention span lyrics full of silly non-sequiturs and half-thoughts elevated to unnatural importance point out rock’s all too serious view of itself.
(PO Box 7495 Van Nuys, CA 91409)