Live: Cheap Girls @ Knitting Factory 3.6.12

God bless the Midwest. America's Heartland has been ponying up the quality rock of late and Cheap Girls are close to the top of the heap. Hailing from the wilds of Lansing, Michigan, said Girls (who are in fact, three dudes) make the rock in the power trio format, paying homage to a host of pop and punk predecessors like the Lemonheads (Deily more than Dando) and Dinosaur Jr. They have a new record called Giant Orange out on Rise that is pretty solid, albeit a little over-produced. You would do well to own it in virtual or actual form.

I rolled into a maybe half-full room as Cheap Girls were setting up, having missed the much buzzed about (and to these old ears, not especially remarkable, on record at least) Sidekicks. The set (pictured above) featured a little over half of the new record, with some choice dips into their previous releases. Ft. Lauderdale popped up at the end of the set, but sadly the new On/Off Switches did not. Cheap Girls may not have a ton of stage presence, but they have songs for days and play their asses off. They'll be on the road a good bit in the coming months, hopefully not mid-carding for some horrible Warped Tour band, so keep an eye peeled here for tour dates within range of your ear and/or eyeholes.

R

Cheap Girls - Giant Orange

Ah, Cheap Girls! The Lansing threesome have been recent faves at JS-NYC HQ in recent history. Anticipation has been high for a new full-length, and wonderfully Spring has brought the thaw as well as the aces new Giant Orange for our pleasure. This one is the first for new label Rise and for better or worse sports the production of Mr. Tom Gabel of Against Me!. That will doubtless appeal more to the Asslight Anthem set more than lovers of genuine unaffected rock goodness, but even his silly ass can't sink this ship.


He do try, though. Giant Orange certainly sounds a little overproduced in places (see the ZZ Top meets Boston guitar tone of Manhattan On Mute), but regardless of questionable engineering, the The Force continues to be strong with our heroes and songs are definitely still there. Six of the ten tracks on Giant Orange are damn solid and the other four ain't all that shabby neither. I'd say On/Off Switches is the current fave, but Giant Orange gets a lot of play around the JS-NYC corporate HQ and the front-runner changes by the day. Share our problems and get Giant Orange here from the Cheap Girls web presence. Lavish us/them with thanks later.

R