A little late on this one, but one of my favorite finds of 2009 was made this past week when I got a copy of Portland’s own Explode Into Colors’ 7” entitled Paper. Released as their final installment in a “singles triptych” on the verbosely named Just For the Hell of It Records (the other two were on Kill Rock Stars and M’lady Records, the latter of which houses a fellow kick-ass all-girl act Finally Punk), Paper packs about as much punch as you can get from two songs.
A drum solo reminiscent of an Amazonian tribal ceremony starts off the A-side title track before bassist Claudia Meza takes over command of the song with her momentum swinging funk line. Meza also takes on the vocal responsibility in the act, spewing a couple of Molly Siegel-esque yelps before settling down and actually singing lyrics which sliver across the melody.
The B-side “Heat” continues much in the same fashion: prominently displaying the talented drum and bass playing while keeping the mystery with wavering, lightly tinged reverbed vocals. Maybe included for comedic effect or some sort of symbolic meaning, the backing vocals slip into a rendition of Outkast’s “Bombs Over Background” mid-way through before Meza kicks in with the shaky second verse.
A 12” EP, composed of six already released songs with one extra thrown in, is scheduled to be released in February, so if you want to just purchase a single item rather than hunt down all three 7” (some of which are out of print), you might want to hold off until then. To tide you over here is an mp3 of “Heat”:
