Between a ROQ & No Place

DRAMARAMA - Hi-Fi Sci-Fi

Hailing from Wayne, Noo Joisey, formed in 1983, Dramarama are best remembered for "Anything, Anything (I'll Give You)," a ditty played to death by Rodney Bingenheimer before the band even had a record deal (FYI: It is the most requested song in the history of KROQ). It's a killer track to be sure, with Peter Wood's brash main riff and John Easdale's gasping delivery-- but hardly the whole story. Throughout their five album discography you will find at least fifteen tracks that put it in deep shade.

I've never met the man, but Easdale, their resident Bard of the Bar Rooms, always struck me as the kinda guy who could talk the most devout nun outta her habit... and into another one; something far more unwholesome. Could it be his lyrics that allow the inner Alpha Male to mingle in perfect harmony with the sensitive laureate? Mebbe like Sean Bonniwell, I've got a Masculine Intuition? I dunno, but on "Hi-Fi Sci-Fi," their 1993 swansong, he bestows some of his finest verbiage upon we undeserving sniveling shits. Take for example "Work for Food," where he spins a tale of an eccentric who wanders the streets of Hell-A:

No one wants to pay me for my for my broken heart
So now I've got this shopping cart
And I keep on rollin'
I can't live without eternal gratitude
And I won't work for food

The punchline being that the subject of the song is a former rock star. As a matter of fact, there's a loose conceptual thread following much the same line of self-deprecation throughout this LP-- as though they knew their days as a band were numbered. In the haunting semi-ballad "Senseless Fun," Easdale proclaims "Every time we load the gun/And say that this one is the one/It's senseless fun... disappointed." Regardless, they go down swinging-- they knew how to combine their sumptuous melodies with unrelenting guit-crunch-- much like Cheap Trick so effortlessly harnessed on their first three longplayers.

Look in comments.

Note: Be sure to stick around for "28 Double Secret Bonus Tracks," a fun knock-off of immortal garage nugget "One Ugly Child" that features cameos by everyone from Mojo Nixon to Davey Jones to Gilbert Gottfried.