Music
Press
Being an indie rocker today means more than pressing your own 7-inch. Boston-based Freezepop not only recorded a demo but also animated a digital video, designed logo gear, and booked an international solo tour. For their effort, the computer-pop artists got the kind of exposure that usually requires a cigar-chomping manager and a record label's budget: The band opened for the Sneaker Pimps and got songs on PS2 games, including the hit Karaoke Revolution. And Freezepop's new album, Fancy Ultra*Fresh, was sold on iTunes and Napster even before the CD was picked up for distribution in brick-and-mortar stores. Goes to show, a big break can be more than luck - it can be engineered.
by Paul Boutin
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.03/play.html?pg=6
- Wired Magazine
The unfazed fembot monotone of singer Liz Enthusiasm — which melds sublimely with the group’s repetitive raygun rhythms — really begs rebooting. You’ll do just that with Fancy Ultra•Fresh, their collection of shiny, plastic pop bits full of ironic humor. - LA Weekly
If Gerry House is country's answer to Spinal Tap and Aqua is the Spinal Tap of Europop, Freezepop may very well be the Spinal Tap of '80s-style synth pop and new wave. Of course, being described as a synth pop/new wave equivalent of Spinal Tap isn't necessarily what Freezepop is aiming for on Fancy Ultra Fresh; in various interviews, the Bostonians have downplayed the strong '80s influences in their wildly infectious music. But on Fancy Ultra Fresh, Freezepop has so much fun with synth pop and new wave stereotypes that you can't help but see this 2004 release as an affectionate celebration of the wackier side of Ronald Reagan/Margaret Thatcher-era pop culture. Comparisons to '80s favorites like the Human League, Soft Cell, Berlin, Duran Duran, and Thomas Dolby are unavoidable, and it would be a mistake to think that Freezepop's three members are merely good at what they do -- they're great at it. In contrast to all the ultra-introspective, angst-ridden lyrics that have come from alternative pop/rock in the '90s and 2000s, lovably goofy items like "Duct Tape My Heart," "Parlez-Vous Freezepop?," "Boys on Film" (as opposed to Duran Duran's "Girls on Film"), and "Chess King" are an exercise in pure, unmitigated fun. Lead singer Liz Enthusiasm isn't try to save the world on this CD; instead, she sings about all-night parties, club-hopping, fashion trends, and male bimbos in tight pants -- and she does it with a deadpan vocal style that is girlish, amusing, silly, sexy (in a detached way), and ironic all at once. Enthusiasm and her colleagues showed a great deal of promise on their first full-length album, Freezepop Forever, and their 2002 EP Fashion Impression Function, but on this superb disc, the New Englanders have truly achieved synth pop/new wave perfection.
-- Alex Henderson - All Music Guide
Remember Freezepops? Your mom would make you eat them on the front stoop because you would end up with the melted snack all over you. Then you got too old for them and felt ridiculous squeezing the little plastic tube for some frozen sugar water. I bet, though, if someone handed you one right now, on a muggy summer evening, you would love it, and you wouldn't care how silly you felt.
And so it is (you're probably guessing) with Freezepop. A few notes into Fancy Ultra-Fresh, the band's second full length, and I was worried. This album had the potential to be a big Europop bomb, but I couldn't resist the fun anymore than I can resist a Flavorice during a typcial Virginia summer. This Freezepop album is a new summer classic.
Freezepop's sound doesn't change much throughout Fancy Ultra-Fresh (except for the slower serious songs) and the steadiness could be viewed as a bit of a shortcoming. On the other hand, the beats are so catchy and 90% of the lyrics are so fun that the group really has no reason to break from its sound. This synthpop is catchy, danceable, and entertaining. Plus, the album's got a great cover of the theme from Jem. There -- now Freezepop's officially taken you from childhood television through adolescent mall intrigue to wherever you are right now, which I hope is dancing around your front porch with a sticky freezepop in each hand.
-- Justin Cober-Lake
- popmatters.com
For all ye olde indie rockers jonesing for that Tiger Trap/Tuscadero-esque sound, Freezepop have arrived with your fix. They are the type of band you may want to hate at first like ABBA or The Strokes, but can’t resist devouring until you have a stomachache. They’re like a combination of Human League and My Little Pony. All of their sounds come from a Twinkie-sized box called a QY70, and vocalist Liz Enthusiasm’s voice will make you feel as though someone had just shot you up with a lethal dose of pixie dust gathered from a chocolate-covered honey cloud.
--Lesley Arfin
http://www.viceland.com/issues/v8n10/htdocs/heroin_candy.php
- Vice Magazine
Discography
the orange ep (archenemy, 1999)
the purple ep (archenemy, 2000)
freezepop forever (archenemy in u.s., elefant records worldwide, 2001)
fashion impression function ep (archenemy, 2002)
“bike thief” 12” (archenemy, 2003, 2004)
hi-five my remix ep (archenemy, 2003)
fancy ultra•fresh (archenemy, 2004)
dancy ultra•fresh 12” (archenemy, 2005)
maxi ultra•fresh ep (archenemy, 2005)
the rokk suite single (cordless recordings/archenemy, 2006)
future future future perfect (rykodisc/cordless recordings/archenemy, 2007)
less talk more rokk remix ep, (rykodisc/cordless recordings/archenemy, 2007)
form activity motion ep, (rykodisc/cordless recordings/archenemy, 2008)
Photos
Bio
Freezepop has always been something of an oxymoron: embraced by both hipsters and nerds; serious about irony; and retro-futuristic. A synth band in a guitar videogame, singing pop songs about rock. And it all somehow makes sense when you listen to the music.
Formed in Boston in the summer of 1999, Freezepop released two homemade EPs and started a DIY machine that would become one of their trademarks. Their debut album, 2000’s Freezepop Forever, was released domestically on their own label, Archenemy, as well as licensed in Europe by the Spanish indiepop label Elefant. Several more EPs followed, and in 2004, Freezepop put out their sophomore album, Fancy Ultra•Fresh. After nearly eight years of self-releasing their CDs, they partnered with Rykodisc/Cordless Recordings for their most recent album, Future Future Future Perfect. Their single “Less Talk More Rokk” was the iTunes #4 dance/electronic song of 2007, and the band swept the 2008 Boston Phoenix/WFNX Best Music Poll, winning the local categories of Best Band, Best Live Act, and Best Album.
While the band has done well on college radio, repeat-charting in the CMJ Top 50, a key factor in Freezepop’s success has been that they have sought out licensing opportunities as an alternate means of getting their music out into the world. A natural fit on videogame soundtracks, the band saw their following grow through songs in the cult music-based games Frequency and Amplitude, and then increase exponentially after appearing in the massively popular Guitar Hero series, Dance Dance Revolution, and Rock Band. Freezepop’s songs are also featured in television shows as diverse as Showtime’s drama The L Word, MTV’s The Hills, and the PBS children’s series Arthur. Freezepop have a strong connection with their fans and have toured extensively, playing energetic, fun, and chaotic shows throughout North America and Europe.
2009 was an eventful year for Freezepop: after a good deal of touring and releasing an EP, the band celebrated their tenth anniversary. The milestone was a bittersweet one, as founding member Kasson Crooker, a.k.a. the Duke of Pannekoeken, retired from the band after farewell shows in Boston and Seattle. Although the split was amicable and there was plenty of lead time, remaining members Liz Enthusiasm and Sean Drinkwater took the better part of six months to sort through a very short list of replacements, and now welcome two new permanent members to their fold, longtime touring member Robert John “Bananas” Foster and newcomer Christmas Disco-Marie Sagan.
“The new members have pretty big shoes to fill, and it’s a testament to the Duke’s talent that we basically needed two people to replace him,” says Drinkwater. The idea of expanding the band to a four-piece to achieve a more robust sound has been on the table for a while, but it took a serious shake-up to actually get there. “The idea that we could reinvent Freezepop somewhat and return to these ideas that have kept popping up over the years, musically and visually, was exciting, even if it grew out of a less-than-ideal situation,” says Enthusiasm.
Freezepop are currently writing and recording the follow-up to Future Future Future Perfect. For more info, please visit www.freezepop.net, or email freezepop@freezepop.net.
Links
