When Hector Bagnod and Chris Donathon of the Medic Droid uploaded their first song “Fer Sure” on MySpace, they didn’t expect it to result in a record deal. In fact, when listeners asked for more music, they would say they weren’t even a real band.
“The band wasn’t supposed to even ever be a band,” Bagnod says. “We just kinda got together to have fun, to write songs, and it ended up going a lot farther than we thought it ever would.”
Less than two years after “Fer Sure” went online, the Phoenix-based power-pop/electronic duo released its first album, “Whats Your Medium,” on Modern Art Records. Even though the effort has only eight songs, the album debuted at No. 33 on the Billboard’s June 21 Top Heatseekers, selling just fewer than 2,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
The 23-year-olds say they never did anything to promote the Medic Droid’s music before getting signed and didn’t plan to publicize much before the record release either. Says Bagnod: “We just wanted to see what we could do like how we did in the beginning — don’t tell anybody and see who buys it.”
The song that got the band noticed starts with the lyric “Fer sure maybe, fer sure not / fer sure eh, fer sure bomb” in a sing-song voice akin to comedic singer Kelly of “Shoes” fame. Near the end of a song is a break into Internet speak and gossipy chatter, with the lyrics “JKJKJK LOLOL / I heart your f*cking makeup / oh my god I love your hair!” Donathon’s vocals are heavily digitized throughout the album, which has elements of pop, punk, dance and electronica. Both band members mention the Locust and Blood Brothers as strong influences, but say they’re inspired by dance music as well.
Bagnod admits the band is “really new” at writing and producing and says the eight songs are the first batch of tracks the two ever wrote together. “I produced the tracks on my computer and we just built up all these ideas and recorded them all,” he says. Since this album is closer in length to an EP, he hopes to do a better job on the next one. “Some of the songs (on “Whats Your Medium”) were still a joke when we had written them,” he says. “With our newer songs and ideas, we want to definitely up what we had on this album, just better production, better music, better songs and more work on live shows.”
The Medic Droid will be on the “Hope for the Hopeless” tour with Kill Hannah, Inner Party System and the White Tie Affair from early-July through late-August.
