Longtime friends of the show Ed Schrader’s Music Beat are back, following up the left jab of 2012’s Jazz Mind with the right hook to the jaw that is Party Jail. The duo continues to explore a gas pedal/brake pedal sonic narrative, careening without warning between cross-eyed tantrums and sultry, eyebrow-cocked croons. While the debut was a tactical strike force of a record, dropping in and plugging you between the eyes before you knew what was happening, this new one is a more intimate, open-air aural assassination. You dance with your shivver in Party Jail.

It’s still loaded with 2:00 shit kickers and hip shakers, but the sound is fuller and hookier. Schrader completes his kit on a few numbers to go full Animal, and the recording is clearer (for to blast at higher levels, of course). With its sloganeered choruses, syrup-reduced bass riffs, and patty-cakes-on-amphetamines drumming, Party Jail feels like swim-move dancing on the hood of a moving car.

Making the most of the minimal setup, the duo play with timbre and tone for variance. Schrader’s a regular Mel Blanc with several distinct vocal personas (more immediate here instead of over-reverbed), and he can pull a huge array of noises from every inch of his floor tom. Devlin Rice rips chords, virtuoso runs, and thick-ringing doomsday lows on his bass – and that’s just on “Televan”. They’re a two-person flash mob.

Loud or soft, Party Jail is a demented pop suppository. You still have time to preorder some vinyl from Infinity Cat before the May 20th release date! Do your best Elvis grunt with Schrader on “Pantomime Jack” and freak to the jailhouse rock.