Polkadot Cadaver is, essentially, Dog Fashion Disco 2.0. For those who don’t know either band, (and why would you?), the brainchild behind both is Maryland’s own Todd Smith! Dog Fashion Disco is one of those genre-bending Mr. Bungle-type rock groups that throws into a blender heavy metal, disco, new wave, punk, ska, spaghetti western ballads, jazz, funk, purées the ever-loving fuck out of it, and deposits the slurry straight into your unwilling ears. After Dog Fashion Disco disbanded in 2007, Smith scooped up Jasan Stepp and John Ensminger from the remnants and forged ahead immediately with what was basically a rebranding. More than any of the other Todd Smith projects (the Alter Boys, El-Creepo!, Knives Out!), Polkadot Cadaver very much just sounds like parent project Dog Fashion Disco.

So why am I writing about Polkadot Cadaver first? Because I know it better than Dog Fashion Disco! Get off my back already.

Polkadot Cadaver’s Bandcamp page

JUMP TO:
(2007) Purgatory Dance Party
(2011) Sex Offender
(2013) Last Call in Jonestown
(2017) Get Possessed

Purgatory Dance Party (2007) – Rating: 9/10
No Full Album Review Yet

What a nice little album. Purgatory Dance Party features an assorted array of catchy, creepy serial killer tunes that mostly sound like the soundtrack to a horror movie about fucked up abandoned carnival, but also the carnival has a hole in the middle of the haunted fun house where the Silence of the Lambs guy has loud sex with Hannibal Lecter. So, throw this on and you’ll be in for a real treat!

The thing that makes Purgatory Dance Party way more exciting than anything else Polkadot Cadaver has released since is the hooks, man! The hooks! This record is loaded with ’em. “Wolf in Jesus Skin” is driven entirely by a manic circus polka rhythm. “Bring Me the Head of Andy Warhol” makes unique, hellish use of a child’s play piano. The melodies are frantic and anxious, replete with John Carpenter synths and alternating clean/extreme singing. The sequencing is ideal too, alternating menacing with upbeat and there’s the occasional folksy and subdued number (“Chloroform Girl” is simply chilling). It’s amazing to me how well the unorthodox use of instruments and the unexpected merging of heavy metal with chintzy horror tropes and progressive song structures results in a run of really memorable and accessible (yes, accessible) songs. They did good.

Of all the Todd Smith projects and releases, Purgatory Dance Party is my clear favorite and probably the quintessential album of the “circus metal” genre. I just learned that the band rerecorded a version of the album in 2020 in order to reclaim rights for their own independent label, I’m looking forward to hearing that shit! Believe you me.

Sex Offender (2011) – Rating: 4/10
No Full Album Review Yet

Man, what a major disappointment after the debut. I must’ve spun this thing 30 times in 10 years and there’s really nothing about it that I’d ever cherish. I feel like I only ever revisit Sex Offender to try to get more out of it. It never works.

It’s a shame that an avantgarde metal group, one that prides itself on out-of-the-box ideas, one with no truly similar counterparts outside of the Todd Smith sphere, made an album with such a lifeless and weak run of songs. The energy feels pretty forced to me, like it’s imitating energy, not to mention a complete lack of memorable melodies whatsoever. To make matters worse, the structures and choruses of most of these songs are extremely similar. Five or six songs in a row employ this slightly annoying soft pop chorus, which is better utilized sparingly by this kind of band. In fact, it ruins an otherwise good song in “Slaughterhouse Striptease”! That song feels like a cut from their first album; jaunty circus madness! But the four tracks before it use the same exact soft pop chorus! Blech! No good!

Highlights, what few exist, include the neat little electronic/industrial touches lapping the edges of the notes…even if it’s still the same stuff they were doing on Purgatory Dance Party anyway, it adds some flavor that keeps it from REALLY being dragged down further. Also, the closer “Forever and a Day” is the best song on the whole album if for no other reason than that it sounds different the rest of the tracks.

Treat this like a real sex offender and don’t let it move into your neighborhood.

Last Call in Jonestown (2013) – Rating: 5/10
No Full Album Review Yet

This really isn’t much better than Sex Offender, but it’s better enough to be noticeable, and even then I don’t think it deserves a full extra point either. BUT I DON’T DO FRACTIONS. In spirit I’ll give this a 4.5, but in practice we’ll keep it at a 5 and I won’t ever think about it again.

So, on one hand, there’s a smidgen of extra personality on Last Call in Jonestown to boost the flavor of horror metal that this band is going for: Jim Jones sampling on the title track, the Harmon-muted trumpet intro/outro on “Animal Kingdom”, the swaggery southern rock of “Transistors of Mercy” featuring the vocals of Clutch frontman Neil Fallon. On the other hand, many of the ideas on this album are recycled and, again, many of these choruses are flat and uninspired. This music is supposed to creep you out and make you uncomfortable, but how in the fuck is that supposed to happen when you’re tuning out through most of the record? Boo! Thumbs down.

There’s not much else to say here. The band basically duplicated Sex Offender.

Get Possessed (2017) – Rating: 6/10
No Full Album Review Yet

Even better still, finally, but it’s still nothing really worth it at the end of the day. I think what really helped their fourth album, honestly, is that it was released shortly after Halloween just like the debut. All this theatrical horror metal fits incredibly well with the fall weather chill, at least here in Chicago. If you’re in Los Angeles or, like, uh, Perth, you wouldn’t be vibin’ the same way.

Other than that, the melodies are a little more interesting and diverse again, so it’s a decent return to form. “Couldn’t Move Far Enough Away”, for example, has some cool watery industrial percussive noises punctuating the creepy atmosphere. “Robot Assisted Suicide” has waves of those Halloweeny John Carpenter-style synths. The songs have some personality again! I’m not finding myself nodding off like I was with the last two albums, which is fantastic in its own right, but I’m going to have to be a LITTLE BITCH and compare this directly to Purgatory Dance Party: I like revisiting the debut frequently. Those songs have melodies that I can remember long after I’m done listening to them. Get Possessed I don’t revisit that frequently. I barely remember the songs long after I’m done listening to them. I do, however, revisit this more frequently than either Sex Offender or Last Call in Jonestown and, unlike those two, I’m not eagerly waiting for the record to finish while I’m listening to it!

Looking forward to LP number 5! I’m sure I’ll have some very equivocal words to say about it.