dupobs’ latest album, drop the coin, is likely the worst you’ve heard in a while. Yet it’s not crap just for crap’s sake. Based on dupobs’ Regressive Manifesto, the group has created an album in which content and production values are perfectly matched. Whereas mainstream pop artists (Britney Spears, Finger Eleven, Radiohead, etc.) take constipating pains to polish the minute details of trite and valueless melodies, dupobs devote no effort whatsoever. Following the Regressive Manifesto, drop the coin was played as sloppily as possible, and recorded only in as much time as it took to write.
And while there is a strong ‘conceptual’ side to this work, the songs are not without sonic interest. On drop the coin, dupobs make use of non-traditional instruments and playing styles to create a sound that as sonically interesting as it is satirical. On drop the coin you will hear not just electric guitar, but also a single snare drum, an un-amplified electric bass guitar played by foot, hair dryer, toy frog, harmonica, randomly sequenced Poly 800 synthesizer, and ‘baby bat’ – a children’s toy baseball bat fitted with microphone.
Standout tracks include Absolut Shit Nights, Drop The Coin, Sawtooth Humples, and Red’s Cross-Clottery Win. Sawtooth Humples, based on the Yukon gold rush, conflates the nation-founding myth with rock n roll gender stereotypes. Red’s Cross-Clottery Win is the theme song for a fictitious Dutch game show in which contestants bet on the demise of hospital patients.

Click here to listen to or buy drop the coin on iTunes.

Click here to listen to or buy drop the coin at CD Baby.