October 21 2002

Plastic Six Nettwerk 2002

ke To my surprise, while listen- ing to this cd | actually found myself enjoying a few of the tracks. Plastic 6 features mostly dance music which is ‘very trancey. Several of the tracks on this album, namely “resurrection” by PPK, are actually quite decent. In con- trast to many of the other crusty dance music albums out there today, this album offers music which is both innovative and capturing. The sound is infectious and the mixes offer new and interest- ing elements to the songs. This is very refreshing due to the fact that many other dance mix compilations offer remixes that do not enhance the quali- ty of the songs themselves. On the negative side, DJ Tiesto is featured on this com- pilation yet again. It seems | cannot escape that Du. Perhaps the album needed to fill up some space so they put one of his disinteresting songs on it. There were a couple of other songs that were not “all that and a bag of chips”, but the album was tolerable. -Philip

Riddlin’ Kids Make Good

| Texas Punk Act Show Their Helpful Side on the Road and Back Home

Most people would think with the rising popularity — of pop/punk hybrid acts like Sum 41 and Blink 182, getting famous making that kind of music would be easy as pie. For the Austin, Texas based Riddlin’ Kids, a big break came after delivering a lot of pie, pizza pie.

The founding members of the band, Clint Baker (vocals, guitar) and Dustin Stroud (gui- tar, vocals) met up when they both worked at the same pizza parlor. They started a band, made some demos, pulled in Mark Johnson (bass), and Dave Keel (drums) to com- plete the lineup...and delivered a lot more pizza. Working up to 50 hours a week while saving up the $6,000 dollars it would take to record a high quality, 5 song demo.

The greasy pizza sweat paid off though. After getting their demo onto an Austin radio sta- tion and winning a spot on the station’s top 50 year end playlist, the Riddlin’ Kids soon found themselves opening for bands like Reel Big Fish and Goldfinger; even landing a spot on the warped tour.

Which isn’t to say that they’re not still totally broke when they're on the road tour- ing, as bassist Mark Johnson will attest.

“We worked like crazy, just crazy hours, saved all our money, and just worked really hard” Johnson recalls over a phone’ conversation, “we saved the money for [record-

ing] the demos. We fought all the way to get where we're at. We're broke on the road, we’re on a bus right now, but [it’s because] our van broke down. We're sharing our bus with another band, Moneen, because their van broke down too.”

The Riddin’

“There is an underground [punk] scene in Austin, it’s very incestual, everyone is in.a band with someone else. It’s tight knit, so we do everything

‘we can to do help out other

bands from Austin. We're all about helping everybody out, if

people had- have

Kids got their start by open-

We're all about helping "t

everybody out, if people

helped us out we

ing for larger Madn’t have helped us wouldn't be acts like’ out we wouldn’t be where we're Goldfinger ’ = at.”

and Reel Big where we're at - Mark The Fish, how was JOhnson Riddlin’ Kids it? refreshing

“Amazing!” Johnson says enthusiastically, “[Goldfinger and Reel Big Fish] was our first big tour. Everyone showed us the ropes, and we learned each other's quirks. Playing for 3000 kids every night was a really good start.’

Of course getting started isn't easy when you're from Austin, Texas, an area of the United States more noted for its cowboy hats than its punk music.

attitude to their peers extends to their fans as well, Johnson says as he describes a Riddlin’ Kids live show. “Live, we're very punk rock, we play, then go out into the crowd, enjoy the show, just hang out with the fans and chill. We don't go and hide backstage, we're still the kids who want to meet the bands.”

Musically, the Riddlin’ Kids get lumped into the popular pop/punk genre, but they’re

Over The Edge CD Rating Guide * This CD made me more extra dumb.

&* A fair effort, but no bananas. #&&* Average, but worth checking out.

: KkaK een Cea marshmallows low &

_Over The Edge Page 11

not complaining about it in the least.

“We love all that kind of music, Treble Charger, Greenday, Sum 41, Blink 182. Our influences are everything under the sun though. It would take forever to list them all, it’s everything from Sentenced to Sinead O’Connor. We don’t have-a main influence, it all kind of meshed together. Our sound is a more rock than punk though, our drumming is more aggressive, and our songs are more melodic.”

Check out the Riddlin’ Kids website, www.riddlinkids.com/ www.riddlinkids.net

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