Music
The best kept secret in music
Press
Rock music you can dance to - it's a tricky one. Consider how the opening track on C4[RT]'s new album sounds like Mansun laid over the top of The Prodigy's "No Good (Start the Dance)" and you'll see the problem. It's hardly a description that makes you want to run to the nearest record shop, is it? But this is really good stuff, and when you reach the Killers-esque electropop of "Something is Wrong" you'll begin to see where this Boston sextet are headed. These songs brandish more ants-in-your-pants excitement than anything that Brandon Flowers and co could muster, and without resorting to the usual image-consciousness and posturing. Furthermore, the intelligence that underpins their shiny pop veneer will ensure that they have a career long after this music ceases to be fashionable. - Rock Sound March 2006
ELECTRO PUNK PARTY MUSIC FROM EX-MEMBERS OF GARRISON.
You can count the number of bands who've mixed contemporary punk with up to date dance and hip-hop production on the fingers of a leper's flaky hand. But imagine if you will, Fugazi playing Prince songs with The Neptunes producing and you come close to the sound achieved on C4RT's (as they're known) debut.
A melange of '80s electro funk, flasetto and all manner of bleeps and squeaks, "Yes..." is an uplifting party album that effortlessly mixes soul, punk, funk and pop without ever appearing contrived -- much like Daryl Palumbo's twisted glitterball disco of Head Automatica. It's an inventive debut and even their cover of John Lennon's "Instant Karma!" is a joyous, cocktail-swilling stomper. Consider the mould broken. - Kerrang! February 25, 2006
Campaign for Real Time heap tons of snarly synth loops, hard knob-tweaks and time-traveling allusions on top of aggressive, feedback-heavy guitars—which pretty much makes them just like your band, only good. C4RT’s debut, Yes … I Mean, No, finds the band balls-deep in space-travel art-rock. The album’s opener, “Turn the Gun on Me,” is a fist-pumper that’s sure to incite geeks everywhere to sloppy riots, and standout tracks “N.F.S.” and “Don Cheadle” are similarly fucking awesome. Hooray for the future! - The Weekly Dig, February 22, 2006
CAMBRIDGE -- For the second year in a row, the wild card was the charm at WBCN's Rock 'n' Roll Rumble. After squeaking into the finals following an especially competitive semifinal battle, Campaign for Real Time took the top prize on Friday, leaving the Rudds in second place and Scamper in third. Unlike the first night of the semis, there was a clear consensus on the band's victory; according to Rumble organizer Shred, the electro warriors won by a wide margin, garnering four out of five first-place votes from the judges.
There was no single ''eureka" moment that tipped the scales. As the first act, Campaign for Real Time simply set the bar higher than the others could ultimately clear. The band was just as electronic (and electric) as in the semis, with keyboardist Felix Coyote feigning shocks from his Moog and singer Rory Stark skulking across the stage looking like Max Fischer from ''Rushmore" as a collegiate hipster.
Right from the start, there was a more pronounced hip-hop feel than in the semifinals, as vocalist Lee ''Big Game" Bronson began by emulating the Streets over a deepening groove. But rock firepower blazed through as well, with Dick Dreyfus's intense drums flying by in ''Turn the Gun on Me" and anchoring the energetic and deceptively slow beat of ''Adjustments."
- The Boston Globe, April 24, 2006
The UK is constantly loading up Boston with much-hyped new rock bands. Now the Hub is firing back with the percussive rock crew Campaign For Real Time, which heads over to Britain next month for a two-week tour in support of its debut, ''Yes, I Mean No." The US release is through longtime Boston indie Curve of the Earth Records, while Europe gets the goods via England's Big Scary Monsters label.
But not before the C4RT's hometown was treated to a CD release show Thursday night at Great Scott. Though on record, C4RT fuses garage rock with burnt-out soul, spacey trip-hop, and a bit of hip-hop, the six-piece group ditched many of its subtle musical diversions for a fevered assault, which supercharged the packed Allston venue.
The band is comprised of seasoned scenesters, dubbed with silly pseudonyms on the CD credits. The band's snotty shtick continued into the show, as an ''android," dressed in bright red shirt and pants with a white tie, was kicked off the stage. ''What's that? Someone from the White Stripes?" scoffed singer-keyboardist Ed McNamara, formerly of Allston rockers Garrison.
It was a swift boot to the media and their role in creating Big Name Acts. C4RT was on a slightly different mission: an anti-marketing mission, one that allowed them to market themselves, of course.
The band careened along on spiraling keys, computer-stored effects, and squally guitars, with former Cracktorch drummer Nick Zampiello driving and grounding songs. The CD's swift hit to the jaw, ''Something is Wrong," landed halfway through. Built around a catchy, anxious stomp, the song displayed one of C4RT's biggest hooks, two great lead singers, McNamara and Brendon Quigley, and their razored vocal harmonies. For the encore, C4RT slowed for ''One in the Gut," reining in glorious mad impulses to build a moody psychedelic epic.
- The Boston Globe, January 21, 2006
Discography
"Yes... I Mean, No" LP (Big Scary Monsters/Curve of the Earth). Nationwide college radio promotion starting on July 25 (promoted by The Planetary Group). "In Your Dreams" has been played on Lamacq Live (BBC Radio 1). "Something is Wrong" has recieved light rotation on WBCN's (Boston) regular programming. "Something is Wrong" has also been played regularly on "Alter Ego" (Mexico City). "The Difference Between Knowing the Name of Something and Knowing Something" was featured on Mike Watt's "The Watt from Pedro Show."
Photos
Feeling a bit camera shy
Bio
AN EXCERPT FROM SUPERNATURAL CACHE'S DUONODE LINEAR NOTES FOR THE DELUXE REMASTERED HOLOPHONIC EDITION OF "YES... I MEAN, NO" (YEAR 2219)
(note: possible trace anomalies in thought pulse/text translation)
"Yes...I Mean, No" by the Campaign for Real Time is the record of the year.
But what year?
The Temporal Adjustment Agency, thankfully, has bigger fish to fry than renegade time travelers disguised as rock bands. And some of you reading this are going to be mighty pissed off in eighty years (yes, it'll happen) when a bunch of the songs that C4RT have recorded are actually written. At that point it's going to come out to the general public that this Timbaland/Talking Heads hybrid from the early part of the 21st century traveled back in time from the future (still with me?) and covered songs that weren't written yet for an audience that was largely hung up on silly, obsolete frippery like iPods and brain transmitter chips. The Campaign For Real Time's tinkerings in the fabric of time/space -- Marie Curie, the designated hitter rule, and wave/particle theory, just to name three -- will be revealed. Widespread scandal, calls for reform of the whole Temporal administration, time machine navigation systems. The advent of a new, darker, regulatory system; widespread protest.
Why even mention this? To be honest with you, reader/listener, the general public of the early 21st century is so naïve as to the possibilities of time travel, possibilities that surround them every day in myriad forms, that the denizens of those space/time sectors inhabited by time continuum riders consider this time (your time) to be a blank, a giant area of temporal static that isn't worth so much as a fizzle of cold thorium mix. Because of the massive ignorance of the general public in the year 2006 (and beyond), the time period is full of time travelers, conducting their day-to-day business in much-needed obscurity. The perfect time, in other words, for "Yes... I Mean, No." Boston's New Alliance Studios, as students of the past know, was a vital part of some of the most important music of your century. Engineer Ethan Dusseault's work on records by Kids Near Water, Smoke or Fire, The Lot Six, and Barbaro (bands you'll be sorry you missed) places him in the upper echelons of producers, despite his obscurity (again, in your time- in mine there's a statue of him next to the ones of David Ortiz, President Clinton IV and John Titor) and unfortunate death in an industrial mixer accident. Ethan's work with New Alliance majordomo Alvan Long has jettisoned him into the annals of rock history, every bit as famous as Brian Epstein or Colonel Tom Parker.
You've got it in your hands right now. Before they kick Conor Oberst's ass at Knebworth in 2008, before Courtney Love's startling post-show revelation in '11. Back when the Campaign was just a band playing these amazing songs. Well, as far as you knew, anyway. Felix Coyote's keyboard was sending coded messages to the biolithium cornerstone dedications in Namibia, directly affecting both the cancer suppressant harvest and his stock options for years. Dick Dreyfus and Falconer Model 7 were on one of their endless quests for hemlock -- don't ask -- while D'Brickashaw Buckingham's bas relief homages to space travel, deposited thousands of years earlier, were being salivated over by Erick Von Danicken (again). Rory Stark and Lee "Big Game" Bronson were off getting fucked up -- big surprise there.
So here it is, folks -- "Yes... I Mean No" by the Campaign For Real Time. Where the hell are we?
(Prior to his cryogenic freezing and subsequent reassimilation, Supernatural Cache wrote for such 21st century information dissemination systems as Chunklet, Pitchfork Media, A-Z 2005, Trouser Press and Perfect Sound Forever. He was thrilled to find, upon his entry into the 23 rd century, that his biography of World B. Free was still considered definitive.)
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