The sound of Catbirds and Cardinals is clean, lo-fi, deeply-engaging, and guaranteed to pull in new legions of fans. It's a clever garage pop set that will lick your pate clean. On Catbirds and Cardinals, Dan Melchior und das Menace successfully meld a hodge podge of disparate elements into a cohesive whole, bringing to mind veteran UK and US underground bands like The Swell Maps, Andrew Klimek, Chrome and Alternative Television more than they do old blues men or the tweedy garage rock conservatives of Dan's past. Catbirds and Cardinals is probably the most overtly 'poppy' Das Menace release, with songs like 'Poison Pete's Holiday' and 'English Shame' lodging in the cranium like carpet warehouse jingles. The recordings retain the overdriven quality Melchior is known for but push the envelope sonically into some unexpected places, with the dream like synths of 'Crow Radio number 1_ showing a marked departure from the overall guitar grime.