REVIEWS
Lisa Mychols is a coquettish and confident front women. Her sturdy power pop
tunes including the Plimsouls-like "Radio Police" and the pop-calypso-cum-
Buddy-Holly-chug of "He's the One" impressed in a big way. I can't wait for
the album, which hopefully will include the group's super-cool take on Devo's
"Uncontrollable Urge."
Alan Haber's Pure Pop
"Pop 'n' Stuff",
John Borak
The Masticators and their 3 song tape has two golden moments; the "Buddy Holly
joins the Ronettes" chug of "He's the One" and the late '70s sounding power
pop of "Radio Police." A band worth keeping two eyes on.
Amplifier,
John Borack
(A review from The Masticators' first 3 song demo: He's the one (pop version),
Never Try, & Radio Police)
The band performed spirited original pop tunes. They seemed to really be
enjoying themselves and their chemistry carried over to the audience.
Flipside
I quite innocently happened upon this band at 1998ís International Pop Overthrow festival, inside a tiny club in the Los Angeles hinterlands. It was
a Sunday afternoon; it was a hundred degrees out in the parking lot and at least TWICE that indoors. But it took less than one song to convince me, and
most everybody else in the room, that here was that rarest of cases when, seemingly from out of nowhere, four musicians gathered on stage and proceeded
to produce a half-hour of out-and-out, pure pop magic. The Masticators, under the nothing short of bewitching command of Lisa Mychols, shook and spun every
ear in the house with one brilliant slice of two-minutes-fifty after another ...each casually tossed off as if they were flipping flapjacks at the nearby
pancake house. But who knows? Maybe this band really CAN create such joyous magic at the simple drop of a D-chord! It may yet be a wee bit early to tell,
but if bands like the Masticators (and songs like theirs) can still be found wailing down that L.A. basin of oblivion, then Power Pop may very well BE
alive and well; all rumors of its demise (or at least exile to the hinterlands of AOL chat rooms) grossly exaggerated.
Gary Gold
GARY PIG GOLD plays with the excellent Ghost Rockets and somehow finds the time to put out the Unsound series with Shane Faubert. You can bug him at PIGPROD@aol.com.
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