It’s not every band that can create its own universe with the release of any new album. For Josh McIlvain’s and Nikitas Menotiades’ Casual Fantastic, such world-building is a given as each album and EP from the Philadelphia-based outfit since 2021’s ‘High Voltage Fever Dream’ is yet another offshoot of Jupiter.
With this week’s release of its new double album, ‘The Wingle and the Wangle,’ their galaxy has expanded even further.
Tied to the double album’s two main themes, death and belonging, the Casual Fantastic — comprised of songwriter McIlvain, with drummer Menotiades and synthesizer player Mike Davis — states that the idea of ‘The Wingle and the Wangle’ are akin to “the little destroyers of the best laid plans.”
McIlvain, a Mount Airy native, continues to describe the meaning and intention of ‘The Wingle and The Wangle’ as the unforeseen bits and seemingly unimportant details that tear apart dreams, reality, assumptions and relationships.
“They can be from within, say one’s personality, or without,” he said. “They can be for good. They can be the little distractions that bring you up from a seemingly endless pit, from where you derive joy, find absurdity, or embrace life.”
If all of McIlvain’s talk of torn-down dreams and life’s absurdity has the sound of something dramatic, it should. Casual Fantastic has explored and exploded its theatricality from the start, holding previous album and EP release events at the Fringe HQ along Delaware Avenue. Plus, McIlvain cofounded the Automatic Arts theater/interdisciplinary performance company where he presents, produces directs and writes.
“I never stopped writing songs (with Automatic Art’s start), so when my kids were no longer super young, Nikitas decided he wanted to play drums with me, that we should play gigs, and concentrated mostly on street fairs — things that paid — and didn’t keep two dads out late.”
Much of Casual Fantastic’s theatricality is rooted in its eclectic sound. While traces of Lou Reed, Depeche Mode, Steely Dan, and a rawer incarnation of the Beach Boys emerge in the vocal timbres and layered harmonies, McIlvain casts a wider net of inspiration. His songwriting also draws from country legends like Lefty Frizzell and George Jones, Louisiana R&B pioneers Percy Mayfield and Art Neville, and eclectic influences such as Brian Eno, Gene Clark, Talking Heads, James Brown, and Donovan.
Drummer Menotiades brings his own legacy to the table—his brother, Paul Menotiades of the Southwest Pennsylvania power pop band Punchline, is credited by McIlvain for significant musical and technical contributions.
‘The Wingle and the Wangle’ finds much of its histrionics in exploding and exploiting the day-to-day along with its pop cultural reference points.
McIlvain points to new songs such as ‘The Dead’ — “about someone so self-involved he’s actually jealous of the attention dead people get at funerals” — and ‘Let Me Know,’ which takes its cues from the phenomenon of purity cults, “at least how they are often portrayed in ‘Orphan Black’ with their top button always buttoned”).
With ‘Fall Styles,’ McIlvain recognizes how he has improved as a songwriter since releasing Casual Fantastic music in that he can grasp complex concepts by the throat, “take an old joke or quip you had in the past and take it more seriously,” remarking caustically on fashion’s marketing in relationship to past loves. “The whole thing goes from what started 20 years ago as a goofy song to one of total heartbreak” says the songwriter.
As for turning ‘The Wingle and The Wangle’ into a two-album collection, McIlvain states that this new recording is a summation of the past five years of he and his bandmates’ playing, the fresh directions that their music moved into and a welcome wagon for adding friends and new voices to the Casual Fantastic mix beyond his own such as Menotiades, David Burgess, Mark Wheeler and Brishen Miller.
“Even though I write everything, I am writing for a band and a band sound, and I’ve always liked a variety of voices in a band,” says McIlvain. “Overall, it’s a pretty dark album, thematically, but I believe that there is a lot of joy in the presentation.”
