Cartoon Epic

Just when I think metal can't possibly get any dumber... a band goes and does something like this. And totally doesn't redeem itself. Right from the start of this demo, Cave Have Rod presents themselves as a joke act. Song titles in very poor English, a band logo that resembles a phallus, and very odd music indeed.

The vocals are the weirdest thing about this whole thing. They're a mix of tuneless "la-la-la"-ing, other high-pitched noises, and standard inhale gurgles. It has to be heard to be believed - listen to the tracks "Super hero Flowing Semen come to save the world" and "Flowing Semen fight with the Demon King" for excellent examples. The vocals on the latter conjure up an image of a little kid running around a pond, going "La la la!" happily, while a giant frog sits on a lily pad in the middle of the pond and croaks loudly. It borders between hilariously amusing and incredibly annoying.

Musically, this is fairly standard groovy death/grind with a drum machine and an odd melodic twist that is pulled out occasionally - fun, playful-sounding guitar riffs that almost sound like a children's song. "Buying vegetables" features one of these riffs prominently, and surprisingly it's not bad: simple, catchy, and fitting with the band's humorous attitude. "Super hero Flowing Semen come to save the world" has an equally fun and bouncy riff with a mid-tempo porngrind style drum groove, making a very toe-tap-worthy atmosphere. On "He sprayed a Demon King out of his body willing to reign the world", the band tries music that's a bit more serious, managing some cool guitar harmonies and a darker atmosphere that regrettably is only a little over a minute long. It's hard to focus on the music, though, when there's some weirdo in the background going "La-la-la" in a falsetto voice.

The mix of decent music and ridiculous vocals is so odd that I honestly don't know what to think of this band, or how to rate them. They have a simple, yet solid musical formula that has some originality to it, and the vocals are definitely weird and original - at the cost of being annoying. You'd think, from the description of the vocals alone, that this would be the worst thing ever, but the music has some kind of charm to it - I just don't know what. If these guys just dropped the weird-ass vocals, which are enough to offset the charm quite a bit, they might have something going for them.