Sardonic rockers Cake have finished their fourth full-length album, their first since jumping ship from Capricorn to Columbia Records. Comfort Eagle, which is slated for a late summer release, will arrive three years after 1998's million-selling Prolonging the Magic, from which the band had hits with "Never There" and "Sheep Go to Heaven." Cake self-produced the new album over the past few months at Paradise Studios in their native Sacramento.

Just as Cake welcomed a new member -- guitarist Xan McCurdy -- with Prolonging, they'll say so long to an old one with the completion of Comfort Eagle. Citing a need to spend more time with his family, drummer Todd Roper has left the band. A Cake spokesperson says the band will soon begin looking for a replacement.

Cake have no immediate tour plans but might well turn up at a few summer festival shows in the coming months.

Meanwhile, ex-Cake guitarist Greg Brown and Victor Damiani and their outfit, Deathray, are themselves hard at work on the follow-up to last year's eponymous debut.

GREG HELLER
(April 28, 2001)