Cake Tuesday

The thing I like about Cake is that they seem to have sprung, fully formed, from some alternative country Greek deity. A lot of bands feel the need to evolve -- not Cake! And I mean that as a compliment.

You can see what I mean with their first album, Motorcade of Generosity, which sounds like pretty much all their music to follow; it set the standard spare and ironic Cake sound. "Jolene" is an excellent song, but I like the nonsensically Zen "Mr. Mastodon Farm" best.



Cake hit it big with Fashion Nugget, which featured the ridiculously overplayed "The Distance." This one's got a bit more range than Motorcade of Generosity and is probably my favorite Cake album. It's hard to pick just one song to sample, and every one here is solid, but "Frank Sinatra" is really good, and the video is very 1990s music video.



Prolonging the Magic, to my ear, sounds just like Fashion Nugget, but people who say they can tell a difference say the departure of two band members gave Cake a decidedly different sound. Whatever. It's as good top to bottom as Fashion Nugget, but I don't like it quite as much overall. Again, picking just one song is tough, so we'll go with my favorite in high school (and a great video).



Comfort Eagle sounds a tiny bit more synth than Cake's previous records. It also has two songs about classical music (sort of). Still, Cake has a formula, and they're sticking to it, and that's a good thing. I really like "Meanwhile, Rick James ..." (even though I can't really tell what's he's saying after that), which would not feel out of place on any other Cake album.



I was disappointed by Pressure Chief. The strongest single is a probably a cover, "Guitar Man," although I also really liked "Waiting." This is the only Cake CD I can't say is one of my favorite albums.



Learning from this, I guess, the excellent B-Sides and Rarities is almost all covers. It's a lot of fun. Cake's alt-country-rock "War Pigs" and "Strangers in the Night" are great examples, but the best is probably their rendition of "Mahna Mahna." I also really like this album's "It's Coming Down," and a couple of classic country covers from George Jones and Buck Owens.