7″ Edition of 500.
Covers Printed By Monoroid
As the new year dawns crummy and dark, we can all take heart in the fact that Salami J.R. (aka Joey Pizza Slice) has returned with a new record. Mr. J.R. (aka Mr. Slice) has maintained his position near the top of the ladder of those who seek to destroy and celebrate pop music in equal measure. His decision to eradicate the erase head from the recording process once and for all remains a move that necessitates a certain radical approach to composition. The act of forcing himself to create sound webs atop extant tracks involves an approach to instant composition that is most often evidenced by instrumental improvisers. But Salami (aka Joey) is a pop dude.
As he sings on the title track (who owes a debt to the Carpenters’ “Superstar”), “A man who can’t write a song can never sing along to a song he wrote.” Since his whole creative approach is literally singing along with songs he already wrote, this is one of Joey (aka Salami)’s boldest existential statements yet. Mr. Slice (aka Mr. J.R.) builds his songs slowly, in layers, with melodic focus shifting in and out quickly, and a naif quality recalling many of the bedroom pop genies of the last century.
But this is not then. This is now. And Joey Pizza Slice (aka Salami J.R.) is definitely a dude who can write a song. – Byron Coley, 2017
