Madame Machine are a three-piece band from Louisville Kentuckee. No, I didn’t just spell Kentuckee wrong… That’s how it’s supposed to be spelled. The historic way. The Daniel Boone way. Three songs on this slab of wax. The A-side… And this is exactly where I fell in love with this band. Right from the start… On this A-side… You see, its ‘traditional’ for the A-side of a single, or EP as the case may be, to be the ‘hit’ of the release. The song that makes you wanna hear more. The song that gives to the reason to flip the record over to hear what else. The motivation of the listener is judge with each needle hitting the record. Will the record be flipped when the side is done, or will it be removed? There’s a choice… Madame Machine uses this A-Side as even further of a test by making “Snakeface” an instrumental. I’m not the biggest fan of the instrumental song. There are whole bands and records devoted to instrumental work. I usually don’t like them because most bands have an interesting quality of their lyrics… Most are at least halfway decent and add to the over all meaning of the song. I could spend hours and thousands of words interpreting “Snakeface” musically to what it means with out lyrics. But… When an instrumental is use as in this case, cleverly… I fully endorse it. “Snakeface” fucks you up. As far as instrumentals go, it’s good. It’s rocking. Your wondering the whole song long when the vocals are gonna kick in if you are new to this band… At the end of the song any new fan would be left wondering is the band is one of those kinds of bands… An instrumental one. Me? I knew better. The bassist for Madame Machine, Salena Filichia, was once in the amazing band GREEN FORMICA TABLE and before that MARCU BROWN… So I checked the band out on the social media sites and spied some You Tube Vids of them… But this trick of the A-Side instrumental, I admire that. Right away, the listener is tested and sussed out. You flip the record or you don’t. You’re in it to win it, or your back tracking to the LZ. It would have been just as easy to turn the double B-Side of this release the double A-Side and let “Snakebite” be the official throwaway B-Side. Beautiful how it all turned out… It really is. Madame Machine has guts. Madame Machine has balls. Madam Machine has a scar on their hand from when they were a baby and got burnt with a cigar… AS AN INFANT! That’s fucking tufff (yeah, with three ‘f’s what’cha gonna do?). “Crystal Ribbons” (see You Tube video below for a performance of this song) gets you going on the B-Side… Great song. Good, driving guitars. Solid drumming. Sang-spoken vocals sounding sly and snarling. Even condescending at times. You hear the whistle and you’re over the top on the trench because it’s an automatic reaction. You are supposed to feel like you may not make it back to that trench again. “Crystal Ribbons” gives you that realism that you are in it to win it because you don’t rise from the trenches thinking you will make it back alive. You assume you will die a non-heroic death but you go anyhow. The backed with (B/W) B-Side, “Great Shame” leaves you. It drops you off and you feel as if you want more. Expertly crafted, superbly listenable… Noise Pollution (label) has a winner here! This record draws a line, takes a stance and leaves you thirsting for more. Some bands live their entire existence in frustration because they struggle to get gigs; at their gigs it’s a struggle against the crowd. Bands like Madame Machine are out there doing what they do not caring if you buy another beer or get their music. They sing more at you than for you. If you listen closely. You can hear the whistle. Don’t rise thinking you will come back… Rise to the occasion because you wont make it back.From NOISE POLLUTION PO Box 72189 Louisville, KY.40272
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