Swell Maps were an experimental post-punk band from Birmingham, England. They were formed by two brothers, Epic Soundtracks and Nikki Sudden. They recorded two influential albums, then called it a day.
Cake Shop (aka Cake Shop Girl), opens with an immediate dash of sparkling but clanky guitars and a high-pitched quavering keyboard tone. It's a hypnotic combination, and it's what instantly hooks me whenever the song comes up on random play. The words themselves never registered; although I heard them, they were just part of the music. They first come in at 0:15:
Cake shop girls grow fingernails
dead long and rather sharp
Is this a cake shop or a mortuary? The flavorless, atonal vocals give me pause to wonder. This is not music to inspire the cake shop girl in us. I will take my business elsewhere, especially as the lyrics go on to say
confectioners don't eat a thing
that's made inside their shops
bottles of crushed beetle
can be bought to turn things red
Yeah, eat those beetles! What a great tune, more so now that I understand the lyrics. It's a swell song, Swell Maps.
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