Dare to dominate

When your live shows are as manic and memorable as The Coke Dares’, getting the same spirit on a record is a hard task. But the Bloomington punk act does it with ease on their new album Feelin’ Up, never letting down the energy during its 23 minutes.

Feelin’ Up manages to avoid all the common punk-album fates – monotony, taking your band too seriously and believing punk songs need to be as long as other songs. It’s rife with spicy guitar solos and lyrics awakening the mundane, and only a handful of songs clock in over one minute.

A 33-track, 23-minute album with songs that average about 40 seconds – one even clocking in at four seconds – might sound gimmicky, but for The Coke Dares, those lengths are all that’s necessary to develop a hook and attach it to their hilarious observations and fantasies about their surroundings. After all, why drag a song out when stereos have rewind buttons?

Bloomington dwellers will especially appreciate The Coke Dares’ lyrics about life in Hoosierland, with songs like “There’s a Meth Lab on my Street” and “Martinsville Blues,” which tells the story of a West Coast Casanova snagging women in Martinsville and Bedford.

“Ronald McDonald” includes the lyric: “Somebody said I looked like Ronald McDonald with a beard, so we played darts till I couldn’t stand up anymore” – which has the high possibility of being a Video Saloon reference.

Other song topics on Feelin’ Up include zombies, satellites and fantasizing about getting as stoned as Neil Young (“…because he gets higher than anyone you know/ And if I could get as high as Neil Young does, then maybe I could write a song as good as one of his”).

Besides the lyrics, the album’s other highlight is its guitars. They’re brief but wacked out and full of force, like gamma-ray bursts in outer space; virtuosic but fast, like classic rock on speed.

What Feelin’ Up comes down to is a 23-minute thrill ride of passion and insanity – and probably the best summertime album you’ll hear the whole season.