The Sexy Accident

The Sexy Accident packs a whole lot into a tight package.

On their latest release, KINDA LIKE FIREWORKS, this Kansas City three-piece tackles love, lust, loss and infidelity with peculiar panache and tremendous pop sensibility. Continuing the tradition of bands like The Wedding Present, The Cars and early Elvis Costello, the lyrics are sharp, the guitars alternately scathe and soothe, and the drums are blisteringly fast. The songs are intelligent, considered and insightful, but always played and sung with an intensity and urgency that rings of first hand experience.

Jesse Kates, the band's lyricist and singer, has a deft tongue. Whether recounting the perils of an Internet affair on Baby, it's not cheating, "yeah I know about the tricks / the risks you run with point and click / and I'll be rightly called a prick / I just hope that you're a chick," alluding to the seemingly impossible in Stall, "when you were mine you were so shy that you would hide at your boyfriend's place," or declaring immodest intentions in Flirting with Disaster "I want to unbutton / reveal your bellybutton," Kates is never at a loss for words, though you'd have to ask his wife whether they're the right ones.

Jesse Kates (guitar & singing)

I picked up a guitar for the first time in 1996, but I couldn't play right-handed due to an old capture-the-flag injury, so I played my roommate's classical upside-down. For weeks I drove everyone crazy by playing the same Archers of Loaf melody again and again on one string. I've been playing lefty ever since.

My musical "career" began with Pittsburgh-based indie rockers Whitford, who recorded two wonderful albums of instrumental music featuring guitar, drums, 8-string bass and sax. We played as many shows as we could before we went our seperate ways.

In 2004 I released my first solo album, Sleight of Hand, a bunch of loop-based solo guitar stuff that I find pretty dreamy.

Now I'm writing pop songs. Do you like them?

Patrick Fent (bass)

In the legend, Patrick is a roguish libertine who takes great pleasure in seducing women and (in most versions) enjoys fighting their champions.

The main force of the legend revolves around his either raping or seducing a young woman of noble family, and killing her father.

Later, he encounters a statue of the father in a cemetery and impiously invites it home to dine with him, an invitation the statue gladly accepts.

The ghost of the father arrives for dinner and in turn invites Patrick to dine with him in the cemetery.

Patrick accepts and goes to the grave where the statue asks to shake Patrick's hand. When he extends his arm, the statue grabs him and drags him away to Hell.

Daniel Torrence (drums)

Daniel is a legendary sea monster of gargantuan size, said to have dwelled off the coasts of Norway and Iceland.

The sheer size and fearsome appearance attributed to the drummer have made him a common ocean-dwelling monster in various fictional works.

The legend of Daniel may actually have originated from sightings of real Daniels that are estimated to grow to 13 metres (43 feet) in length, including the tentacles. These creatures live at great depths, but will surface to hunt prey and reportedly have attacked small ships.