Kid Congo Powers & the Pink Monkey Birds “Rare as the Yeti”
It was about three years ago that I first heard Kid Congo Powers. Originally I was drawn to the musician’s guitar tracks which were pieced together with minimal production value, but later I grew to appreciate his slower paced songs that seemed to fill a room with a smokey cloud of his potent vocals (“Power” would be the best example of this). His latest album, Dracula Boots, takes on a different sound however. It’s lacking a lot of the same flavor as his previous efforts; rather than having tracks that lean toward opposing ends of the musical spectrum, most of the songs sound far too similar and land right in the middle. There is an exception that stands out from the rest of the pack however, “Rare as the Yeti.”
The song focuses on a rigid guitar riff that accentuates the basic rhymes and cautious vocal pace that Kid Congo takes throughout. I still have no idea what lines like “Gingersnap, jock-strap trap” mean within the context of the song, but as a surrounding gust of whirling, hissing pedals takes over, the track those words are soon forgotten. “Yeti” is prime example of Kid Congo’s ability to enhance a song simply with the swagger of his voice, and is a fantastic introduction to an artist who has been working on his craft for over three decades.
