Audio Karate

Lady Melody (Kung Fu)
by Lauren Bussard

If ’80s skate punk and ’70s medieval metal had a love-child, the result would be Lady Melody, Audio Karate‘s second full-length, an eclectic album that avoids the standard repetition of three or four chords and replaces them with aggressive, complex, and relentless melodies and tones that offer a surprise around every song change.

And here’s why this is a good and a bad thing: The album includes such a varying spectrum of sounds that I suspect the average listener will strongly dislike at least a couple of the songs but will absolutely love the rest, and vice versa. Take me, for example: I really like the melodic, Saves The Day-esque crooning of “Ms. Foreign Friendly” and “Aim to Please,” but the piercing and disharmonious screaming during “Catch and Release” really turns my eardrums to liquefied spaghetti. And that makes me think of anything but the title, Lady Melody.
(PO Box 38009 Hollywood, CA 90038)