The Japanese quartet of wild men and women known as
Polysics had been doing basically the same thing for a decade by the time they released
Absolute Polysics in 2010. Luckily, their main trick of blending frantic punk rock and the kind of electronic sounds Mario and Luigi would surely recognize hadn’t grown stale. The album has enough bouncing energy to carry it over any dull spots (of which there are none) and make it a perfect soundtrack to the short-attention-span world it was released into. There are also enough hooks to make the record sound like a collection of singles, enough screaming guitars to keep guitar heroes happy, and just the right blend of sugary sweetness and spiky attitude. Unlike many bands who stay together for a decade, there is no sense of treading water or punching a clock on
Absolute, it sounds fresh enough to be their debut and the group has lost none of the spark that made it so great to begin with. All that being said, the only downside to a
Polysics' record is that the constant barrage of sound can be a bit much, and sometimes the band is best taken in small doses. You never get that feeling with
Absolute, though; it is both short enough and varied enough to work nearly flawlessly. They may not be able to keep it up for another decade, but as of 2010, if you are looking for video game punk made with fun and silly abandon; this is where you need to go first.