The Soda Pop Kids

One thing the punk revivalists tend to forget is that the first wave of punk bands, from the Flamin’ Groovies to MC5 to the New York Dolls to the Ramones, were hugely influenced by '50s and pre-psych '60s rock. Treating 1977 as “year zero” produces music that lacks the beating rock ‘n’ roll heart of a song like Blondie’s "In the Flesh" or The Clash’s "Brand New Cadillac". The Soda Pop Kids don't fall into this trap: Write Home owes as much to the early Beatles or even Buddy Holly as it does CBGB’s. The songs are dead simple, sounding like two-minute pure pop blasts even when the song lengths creep up to over twice that long. Singer Jonny P. Jewels has a classic snot-punk yarl more than a little reminiscent of both David Johansen and Stiv Bators, and dueling guitarists Zach Brooks and Diet D (big ups for the stage names, by the way) have the whole mid-'70s trash punk thing down cold, but it's the way songs like "Electric Blood" and "Memory Lane" (featuring a bass line reminiscent of, of all things, Little Peggy March’s "I Will Follow Him") reach back to the glory days of unpretentious rock ‘n’ roll that makes Write Home such a giddy delight. - All Music.com

The first song “Put on Your Tight Pants” is so catchy and perfect. Now I can’t get this gooey glob of glam punk outta my CD player. “Chained with Your Love” and “Memory Lane” have those ‘50s “ooo-wah-ooo” backing vocals that I’m an absolute sucker for. Listening to this CD is like shooting cotton candy intravenously, chugging Swizzle Stix, and chasing it down with root beer spiked with cocaine. Cheers to the sugar rush. - Razorcake Magazine

First off, the best two tracks here are "Put On Your Tight Pants" (could this be a tribute to Maddy Tightpants, editor of Tight Pants fanzine?) and more to the point, "Electric Blood". This track combines some thirsty (no pun intended) Dead Boys rawk with the band's trademark Damned/Boys/'77 hook fest. I'll close out the review with an anecdotal description of the band's appeal:

You're craving the rush of that first belt of whiskey. You want the sugary allure of a cold Coke. You're jonesin' for a smoke. You walk into a club as these guys play and, lo and behold, a young hottie hands you a rum and Coke and a freshly lit cigarette. These guys are dolled-up Richie Edward types who bring on the sugar rush as catchy and raw as you can take it. The sensory aesthetic of their sound is a tri-fold convergence of the sweet bliss of a cold Coke on a hot day, the randy sulk of intoxication brought about by the whiskey, and a gritty grind so redolent of that addictive smoke. Listen to these guys, and you'll be dancing like the Napolean Dynamite character having been matriculated to some 1978 Saturday Night Live skit. Yeah, they play it old school, but boogyin' never goes out of style. - Now Wave Magazine

Every once in a while a band comes along that absolutely just gets it. The Soda Pop Kids are that band. They don’t try to sound like anyone else in particular. They don’t try to mimic a particular style or limit themselves to a specific sub-genre. They just play rawk ‘n’ roll, fast and loose, with fire and conviction and total disdain for any naysayers or hipsters who would say rock is dead or the kids have all moved on to hip hop. There’s a fury and a passion to The Soda Pop Kids that comes across as sincere and totally believable. I love the “ooh la la la” background vocals, the just-about-to-slip-off-key lead vocals, the string-shredding guitar work – everything about every song on this disc is just exactly perfect in its glorious imperfections. I urge you, take my advice: Put on your tight pants, bop it up, have a couple shots of whiskey, get chained with your love, get tight, and leave Kill City. I know that doesn’t make any sense, but that's what listening to this disc will do to you. Fast paced, sloppy, glam punk blues-a-billy from the great northwest is what I’m talking about, and you don’t want to get left out. They used to be called something else, and come from somewhere else, and all the guys were in different bands before this one. So what? If this is the only record The Soda Pop Kids ever put out, that'll be enough to secure them a spot in the BMO pantheon. - BMO's World