Mrs. Magician is a San Diego based garage and kinda-sorta surf-rock group on Swami Records, the label founded by guitarist John Reis of Hot Snakes and Drive Like Jehu.
The band recently dropped a single from upcoming album Bermuda scheduled to release May 20. Their debut LP, Strange Heaven, sounds like a happy-go-lucky surf-rock record thrown into a tar pit. The lyrics on “The Dead 80s” are detached and cynical, complemented all the more so by the vocalist’s lazy affect that almost sounds like The Strokes‘ Julian Casablancas imitation.
Still, the chords are just off kilter enough that the song avoids being predictably cliche — as so many other lo-fi garage rock acts tend to be. It’s a dreary song no doubt, but oddly catchy in its nihilism.
