DETAILS

Teledrome with The Soft Option & Rhythms of Cruelty


More in: Rock / Pop

Listening to Teledrome, you can tell that a carefully formed, futuristic vision is being exorcised and put to tape. Songs with titles like “Double Visions,” “New Motion” and “Non Future” offer a glimpse into a world of screeching new-wave synths, flashing neon lights, once-new technology and human isolation. It’s all a bit unsettling, but never delivered without a dose of the band’s trademark sense of humour and camp. Speaking with Ryan Sadler, who writes and records all of Teledrome’s music in his Calgary basement, the image becomes slightly clearer.

“I had a concept for the whole thing,” he says. “The whole album is trying to paint a picture of this future/retro thing. Obviously Gary Numan is a big influence, and late ’70s power-pop stuff.” These influences, and Sadler’s science fiction-nodding concept, inform every aspect of Teledrome, including the band’s name. “There’s the Videodrome reference, and it sounds kind of futurey. And there’s the power-pop telephone reference that I like too. It’s like a Nerves reference or Busy Signals. There’s a whole schlock of phone-call songs in the power-pop world.”

“In the late ’70s, the film Heavy Metal came out and Devo’s on the soundtrack, and some other bands,” says Sadler. “They’re trying to do this futuristic rock the best they know how, which is kind of what I tried to do.”

Teledrome’s music is, at least superficially, a composite of these influences, but it isn’t new wave revivalism, and it certainly isn’t the same power-pop that you’ve heard a million times. It is a unique blend of a number of disparate elements which, when put together, sound contemporary and exciting. It’s as if Teledrome have arrived in a time machine, but no one knows where they came from.

In fact, Teledrome’s arrival is a much anticipated event, and one long in the works. “It could have happened faster, but I wasn’t in a rush,” says Sadler. “There were 20-some demos, and I was just doing it in my spare time for the last year. I’ve got this reel-to-reel, so all the drum tracks went on that to make it sound a little wonky. I wanted to add some character to it.”

All of the drum tracks that can be heard on Teledrome’s upcoming eight-song debut were created by Sadler using a Yamaha drum machine, in typical idiosyncratic fashion. “There’s no cymbals on it. A lot of Cramps records don’t have cymbals. I don’t really like cymbals too much.”

Now, Teledrome is about to make its debut as a live entity. Sadler has recruited a full, three-person backing band, but it’s taken some time to get the recorded material ready for the stage. “We haven’t been rushing it. I don’t feel pressed to do shows. There’s no bass guitar in the band. There’s bass on the record, but live it’s just going to be guitar, keyboards and synths.”

And though the first Teledrome record still needs to be released, Sadler is still looking deep into the future. “I’ve already started another record, so hopefully another one will be coming out early next year.”