What the fuck is this? Antony & The Johnsons meets Nina Hagen in an S&M biker bar? This San Franciscan sextet is led by the enigmatic Randy Walker, a sexy, psychotic, self-confessed ?total fagatron? hiding behind the butchered mug of his alter ego, Emile, a plastic surgery-addicted Belgian ? hence the band name ? who speaks no English, but somehow manages to sing it quite elegantly! (In his spare time, Walker, fronting the chamber rock quartet Carletta Sue Kay ? named after his cousin, who?s serving 20 years in an Iowa penitentiary for trying to blow up her boyfriend?s house ? has been known to ?throw on a big ugly dress and a bad wig and sing [his songs] on stage to an audience of mostly gay men.?) While all, some, or most of the preceding bio may be slightly prefabricated, clearly Mr. Walker was born to rock and roll! And although the queer indie scene has mostly passed me bi, MCB are one of the hottest draws in SF and El Lay, and were even nominated for the 2007 GayVN Award for Best Music (their submission was ?Going Down,? an early track not included here.)

Walker?s voice soars to Alison (Yazoo) Moyet, paintpeeling proportions on the haunting rendition of the Roger Miller spiritual hymn, ?The Crossing? (a genius cover choice that puts Antony & The Johnsons to shame) and flutters back to Earth for the campy cabaret rap of ?The Ugly American.? ?Washed Up? is a wiggly, dancefloor instrumental that morphs into a wordless, Klaus Nomi-inspired operatic solo and ?Tweaker Bitch? delves into glam territory. ?Pig Dog? shrieks like AC/DC driving the porcelain bus, but then ?Bundle of Contradictions? comes along and pushes all the right ?80?s pop buttons and had me doing the tubesteak boogie across my kitchen floor! Closer, ?Girl Stuck In A Parade? sounds like an outtake from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and by this point, not even the mostly instrumental (thankfully!), ?Sodomy? could dampen my spirits. And the 40-inch, fold out poster of the album cover is sure to become a collector?s item ? if you can manage to tear it down from your wall long enough to part with it!

I don?t know whether to recommend this to Nina Hagen, Klaus Nomi, Alex Harvey, or David Bowie fans ? probably all will find something to smile about ? but one thing?s for certain: John Waters would love these guys. Maybe they can score his next soundtrack! 7/10 -- Jeff Penczak (22 July, 2008)