Austin Sound

Essentially a one-man album, Take a Look Out Your Window leaves you feeling giddy, giggly, and silly. The band is Pataphysics but it’s Patrick Healy bathing under the heat lamps, dancing, clutching the microphone to his heart, crowned by a fuzzy wolf hat and sacrificing the profane. “I’m a children’s music performer. [K]ids love making fun of everything that is sacred - no exception.” Assuming most of us have the good sense to still be childlike, the 350 copies of Pataphysics’ album will likely be gobbled up like Oreos spirited from grandma’s cookie jar. So do yourself a favor and look for it.

Lest you think that the band name promises an exercise in “the science of imaginary solutions, which symbolically attributes the properties of objects, described by their virtuality, to their lineaments” and feel a bit cowed by Pataphysics, fret not. Choosing the name of the project was merely a convenient and cute pun, not a statement of intent. Not to be restrained, however, Healy wrote me saying, “We’re just an eccentric rock group I guess - we might get weirder and work in theories of ‘Pataphysics’ when we mature musically. Who knows.”

Among other unknowns is how the influence of the other four musicians receiving credit on the album¹ will alter future recordings. Eight of the 16 tracks are plain Pat (spazzy and bouncy and sometimes slothy); only six of the others include current band members - although it’s done so well that I had to double check with the band. Yet ultimately the sound of Take a Look Out Your Window is the sonancy of Healy, reverberating polka dots of synth, squiggles of bass, and ricochets of guitar.

The longstanding solo nature of the project certainly doesn’t harm the oddity or energy of the album. Instead the songs have a magnetism - as though sound particles are condensed and held, revolving around the mass of gravity that Healy has harnessed. He moves each track over hills and dales with aspects of his should-have-been-a-superhero changes in voice, tons of synth, guitar, and bass. True to the irreverent thesis, “Magic Bullet” leisurely wraps itself around JFK’s assassination, delivering up not just punning amusements like “now approaching the point of interest …it was a magic bullet” but also rifling in dramatic vocals. “Stake” creeps and dips into the midnight lullabies of Minuteman nannies. “Listen up and I’ll only say it once, there’s a Mexican that threatens your existence / … / do be fast or alas you will not last for the Mexican sleeps with one eye open/ … / you must kill him now, your life is at stake.” Even “Mecca”, a short, wobbly instrumental march musters memorable with bass, synth, and a little helping of tambourine.

“Ladyfriend” steps on the notion that more than two lines are necessary for a good song. Craftily repeating, “I lost my ladyfriend while howling at the moon,” you feel as though there’s an entire story being subliminally conveyed. “Miniskirts and Bikinis” is another savory bit, fun and just a little nutty. Knowing that it was penned for a self-help radio show on KOOP, the lines “you don’t have to be rich to wear a miniskirt in the mall / you don’t have to look nice to wear a bikini at all” shine just a little brighter. Besides, who could deny the joyous vision of squirrels in miniskirts? “Shopping Mall”, benefiting from LaComette’s solo guitar, is a chronicle of two kids working together in a mall, dropping acid, her getting pregnant, him losing his job—all revealed as through a resigned beach party atmosphere.

Because Healy, Dirk Mitchner, and Chef Pittman started playing together in May 2007 but recording started almost a year earlier, their accessory presence on the album (Mitchner appears only twice, vocally on “You Make Me Feel Like a Weirdo” and playing bass on “American Mannequin”–although he’s sure to add his psychedelic charm to future recordings) isn’t entirely shocking. LaComette and Erich Ragsdale are peppered liberally throughout the album on guitar, synth, and drums but never take a leading role. The remaining tracks, quirky to the last note, host an assorted cast of members from local bands Yellow Fever, Count Dracula’s Weed Smuggling Jam Engine, and Belaire.²

But basically, we’re talking about an album by a guy who performed for a Chicago children’s show, getting kids to shimmy, flail their little arms around, and sing “Jesus was a homewrecker / …Jesus grow a handlebar mustache for me.”³ If you’re not terribly interested in what he’s saying, you won’t have as much fun. Don’t get me wrong, unless someone is squirting lemon juice in your eye, you’ll smile. But perhaps the best summary of the album is found in something else Healy wrote, “Gut reactions will manifest themselves shortly, and I will have time to reflect.”⁴ But until such a time as you can schedule deep and abiding consideration, just enjoy.

¹Patrick Healy (primary vocalist & guitarist), Matthew “Lockemup” LaComette (lead guitarist), Dirk Mitchener (bass guitar), Erich “Mr. E” Ragsdale (synth player), and Chef Pittman (drummer)

²Adam Jones on “Underwater”; Preston Dukes on “Underwater” and “American Mannequin (AM)”; Tim Bond on “AM”; Cari Palazzolo on “AM”; Jennifer Moore & Isabel Martin on “Weirdo”

³www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0e6U1ZWpNU

⁴“My Blood Has Been to the Moon”

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