Trans Am
Futureworld
On Sale Now
For $10.98

Robot hymns, moms, gold chains, and Mickey Mouse all turned up at Washington DC’s Black Cat during a recent visit from Trans Am. No, it wasn’t another muscle car show at the local convention center. In fact, the word "convention" and "Trans Am" do not even fit in the same sentence.

Trans Am, the DC-born post-rock trio, packs just as much horsepower as their namesake, and does it with the style of a customized license plate. All the while, their tongues are practically coming through their cheeks.

The band Phil Manley on guitar, keyboards, and vocals, Nathan Means on bass, keyboards, and vocals, and Sebastian Thompson on electronic and traditional drums alternate between Kraftwerkian electronic ditties worthy of an Atari 2600 and 80s arena-rock power ballads.

Trans Am turns the stage into an audio kitchen with Phil posing as head chef, tasting each song as it bubbles and boils. Nathan fills in as sous chef, regulating the mix with bass lines and keyboard. Seb makes the consummate dishwasher, as he bangs away at his drum kit and electronic drum pads, chugging Rolling Rocks for fuel.

Phil Manley (no relation to DC’s other Manley: Dexter) was clad in a classic Mickey Mouse tee, Nathan Means sported a black sleeveless number a la Matt Dillon in "The Outsiders," and the mighty Seb kept drummer tradition alive by going topless.

Nathan and Phil blew the dust off some vintage, analog synth equipment for the show. On tunes like "Television Eyes" off their latest Futureworld CD, Nathan sang robot vocals over a synthesizer they might have picked up at a Duran Duran garage sale. The fact that Nathan and Phil came out from behind the safety of vocal effects to sing a couple songs was a surprise. The band, frustrated with their vocal, er, talents, is hesitant to add vocals to any of their tracks at all, and usually only does so disguised by a vocoder. Before the band was christened "Trans Am," they toyed with the idea of a lead singer, but no one ever worked out.

On "Futureworld," also off the album of the same name, the pair sang through vocoders in unison about innovations like fax machines and telephones for every future boy and future girl and plenty of future boys and girls there were. The crowd, with its share of mod haircuts, had obviously oiled up its gears, busting out old robot dance moves for the aforementioned "Futureworld" and a Bob James-World Class Wrecking Crew hybrid, "Cocaine Computer." Their use of the arena-rock formula was seamless in every crescendo, but they refused to execute the big power chorus pay-off, happy just to cut in with a bleeping synthesizer at 30 BPMs.

You can always count on Trans Am to give a sarcastic nod back to the days when things didn’t have to be Y2K compliant. But the end result is no joke; their performances are inspired, masterfully blending yesterday’s worst to make some of today’s best.

Copyright © 2008 ModernRock.com All Rights Reserved