Artist: Kirby Krackle
Album: Super Powered Love
Label: Kirby Krackle Music
Release Date: July 19, 2011
Kirby Krackle are back with their third album, Super Powered Love. They continue their nerd rock sound with plenty of geekiness, but also branch out a bit in terms of lyrical content. It’s a fine follow-up to last year’s awesome E for Everyone.
I’m clearly a Kirby Krackle fanboy; I’ve attempted to fit in one of their songs into nearly every list I’ve made for this column. One of the reasons for that that I don’t believe I’ve mentioned before is Kyle’s phrasing of the lyrics. The way he sings doesn’t always match what you might expect given the melody and the lyrics. To me, this indicates that he really cares about how the music sounds, that he wants it to sound as good as it possibly can rather than simply going for the obvious. I’ve heard a few early demos of songs that seem to bear this out, too. In short, it’s not just the lyrics; it’s also the phrasing that makes the music so great.
But on to the album itself. Super Powered Love is not just the album title; it’s also a recurrent theme. Nearly every song on the album features some sort of love. The title track, for example, expresses a non-super human guy’s love for his super powered girlfriend. The narrator in the opener, “Then Again, Maybe Not,” on the other hand, has an unrequited crush on his own nemesis. Of course there’s one of my favorites, “Booty Do Math,” expressing love of both brains and beauty. There’s also love of money with “Nerd Money,” which I think captures exactly what most of us geeks would do if we won the lottery. The rather naïve hero of “Big Heart” has an obvious love of humanity but, lacking powers, he has trouble expressing it. Even Mario gets a love song of sorts, “In Another Castle,” the title of which should give a pretty good idea of what it’s about to any Super Mario fans.
That said, there are actually a couple of non-geeky tracks on this album, a change for Kirby Krackle. “Needing a Miracle” could, perhaps, be about superheroes, but I’m not sure there’s really any need to interpret it that way. It’s a testament to the musicianship of the band that even an atheist like me can enjoy something that is about miracles. There’s also “Open Up Your Window,” a song which I at first didn’t really like at all. There’s nothing really geeky about it, and musically it just sort of slips by. On further listening, however, I have grown to like it more; I think it suffers from following “Needing a Miracle,” which is a better song. Actually, that’s my one criticism of this album, that two kind of slow non-geeky tracks are put together after the equally slow “Rainbow Bridge.” I think if they were separated it would work better (of course, I could be wrong).
Like E for Everyone, Super Powered Love features some great guests. GMK the Great returns to rap on a parody of 50 Cent’s “Candy Shop” called “Comic Shop,” a love song between two comic book lovers (hopefully this one doesn’t turn out like “Up Up Down Down”) which also features the wonderful Kristina Horner from ALL CAPS. Also joining the band to showcase his raps skills is fellow comic-book musician Adam WarRock. His introduction on “Booty Do Math” is great: “These numerators, add ’em… Adam,” Kyle sings in the beginning of the bridge after which WarRock lays down his own thoughts on the sexiness of nerdy girls.
Overall, Super Powered Love is an enjoyable album. If you haven’t already checked out Kirby Krackle (and if you’re reading this column, why the heck haven’t you?), and even if you have, be sure to grab your copy of Super Powered Love. You won’t regret it.
Track Listing:
- Then Again, Maybe Not
- Bite Of Another
- Booty Do Math [feat. Adam WarRock]
- Big Heart
- Hunt ‘Em All Down
- In Another Castle
- Nerd Money
- Super Powered Love
- Comic Shop [feat. GMK the Great & Kristina Horner]
- Rainbow Bridge
- Needing A Miracle
- Open Up Your Window
- I Wanna Live In A World Full Of Heroes
