The Dead Milkmen – still snotty after all these years and whatever

Oh, I was really REALLY looking forward to this new Dead Milkmen elpee. Every Dead Milkmen record has its moment, if not moments… Big Lizard In My Back Yard had “Bitchin’ Camaro,” Eat Your Paisley had “The Thing That Only Eats Hippies,” Bucky Fellini (one of my all-time favorite elpee titles… I used to use Bucky Fellini as a fake handle years ago when I wanted to scribble anonymously) had, well… it had that great title, and Beelzebubba (another great title) had their merely huge and legit hit “Punk Rock Girl” AND “Stuart,” which I love… the whole Burrow Owl obsession is insanely funny. After Metaphysical Graffiti, which I thought was a letdown, I just stopped listening to The Dead Milkmen. They made some ceedee in the late ninties (I think) and someone mailed a copy of it to me but I remember not really caring about it so much, and I think I sold it on ebay.

Anyway, I’ve been really bizzy with some huge personal/professional changes lately and I was looking for new music that I could get my brain around quickly and bang out a strip before deadline, so I was happy to see The Dead Milkmen were back. I know their history, and writing a strip for a band with a history is way easier than a new band for a variety of reasons, but… I’m not really that excited about The King In Yellow to be honest. It’s not a total dog… “Can’t Relax” is by far my favorite. It has a sticky melody and is fun to sing along with, “Buried In The Sky” takes shots at religion and is funny and weird but, by now, kinda predictable. “Or Maybe It Is” hits a sarcastic bullseye when Rodney Anonymous sings about people “Wasting their time reading books about sensitive vampires” followed by some sweet sounding xylophone. Those are the highlights. The rest is average or worse, and I get the feeling that not too many people care about these guys anymore, and they probably know it.