Poetic Greatness!

THE RADIOACTIVE CHICKENHEADS
GROWINGMOLD
10-TRACK FULL-LENGTH CD

Quickie back story: costumed funny-ha-ha band gigs around and puts out a couple of records during the '90s, vanishes for several years, then suddenly shows up again in our mailbox with a new album, a new name and—we think—a new sound (didn't these guys used to be a ska band? Sort of a B-grade Aquabats?). Formerly known as Joe and the Chickenheads—what happened to Joe? Too many nights spent binging on whores and blow?—the reborn Radioactive C-Heads have dropped the horn section we could swear they once had (we would check, but all their old stuff is buried waydeep in our CD bin) for a sound that's, we hesitate to say, mature.As mature as tunes that are about Chuck E. Cheese, ugly girls and child eating can get, anyway. (That last song, "I Eat Kids," plus "I Looked Into the Mirror, What did the Mirror Say?," was penned by controversial children's singer/songwriter Barry Louis Polisar, whose other songs—"Don't Put Your Finger Up Your Nose" and "Mom Said 'No,' So I Asked 'Why?'"—nearly got him banned from performing in public schools; props to the Chickenheads for recognizing poetic greatness.) Thing is, this is a band that's best swallowed live in all their silly carrot-, chicken- and tomato-masked glory—not on CD, where their lyrics are funny and all, and the sonic nods to Phil Spector's Wall of Sound and sci-fi movie soundtracks are amusingly campy, but you can never grasp the entire C-Head experience. GrowingMoldis more of an invitation to a better party happening elsewhere.

Contact: www.myspace.com/chickenheads; chickenheads@cluckin.com

OC and Long Beach bands and musicians! Mail your CDs and tapes (along with your vital contact info, plus any impending performance dates) for possible review to: Locals Only,OC Weekly, 1666 N. Main St., Ste. 500, Santa Ana, CA 92701-7417.