"Love You Madly" by CAKE

In this post, I’d like to focus on a song by the band CAKE (I never realized they stylized their name in all-caps until today). They're probably best known for two songs: “The Distance” and “Short Skirt/Long Jacket.” Today though, I’m writing about “Love You Madly.”

CAKE clearly favors certain attributes when it comes to the composition of its music. The equation to a typical CAKE song would probably look something like this: Catchy bass/guitar riff + trumpet + uncommon percussion instruments (usually the vibraslap) + monotone, deadpan vocals. “Love You Madly” checks off all of those boxes.

One thing I want to be clear about, however, is that I don’t think CAKE is formulaic. Sure, they do certain things in a lot of their songs, but it’s not to the point where they’re just churning out different versions of the same song. Each of their songs has a unique personality and is catchy in its own way.

As for “Love You Madly,” there are a few things I want to mention about it. Firstly, vocalist John McCrea ventures a bit further onto the “singing” side of the singing/talking scale for this one, as opposed to the opposite for the aforementioned “The Distance” and “Short Skirt/Long Jacket.” I think he does both well, but I prefer the songs where he is singing to the ones where he is essentially just speaking. Secondly, there’s a nice layer of bongos (maybe congas?) that are in the background of most of the song, which adds to its toe-tapping quality. Thirdly, a lot of the bass/guitar riffs in CAKE songs are catchy, but both of them in “Love You Madly” are, to me at least, exceptionally catchy and they mesh together so well. Finally, about 2/3rds of the way through the song, everything cuts out except the vocals, the keyboards, and the snare drum. The keyboardist (four members are credited with playing keyboards on the album, so I’m not sure which one it is) doesn’t lift his fingers off of the keys during the entire part, creating tension for a few seconds before everything floods back in simultaneously and the song continues. I don’t know about anyone else, but I love when songs do this (and of course, this happens in “Good Vibrations” as well, though I think I forgot to mention it in that post).

CAKE is one of those bands that I used to be really into, but I forgot just how into them I used to be. Like The Dandy Warhols, they write a lot of extremely catchy music and I think they’re worth a listen. Besides “The Distance,” “Short Skirt/Long Jacket,” and “Love You Madly,” I can’t write about this band without mentioning their cover of “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor. I love covers where the band really tries to make the song theirs and that’s exactly what CAKE does here. “Daria,” like “Love You Madly,” lands on the “singing” side of John McCrea’s singing/talking scale. For the most part, “Frank Sinatra” follows the equation I mentioned earlier, but unlike a lot of other CAKE songs, it sounds lonely and almost haunting. In my opinion, “Sick of You” is the closest to “Love You Madly” when it comes to catchy riffs and also features a great keyboard part.

So, if you like your sarcastic alt-rock with a side of trumpets and vibraslaps, I would strongly recommend “Love You Madly” (and basically CAKE’s entire discography).