You know when you’re listening to a song you haven’t heard before and after a few bars, it hits you… It’s a dang cover! Well, California’s Candy Whips are ready to wallop you (nicely) with classic soul hits to the head with their new album MOONLIGHT which comes out August 26, 2025 on iconic New Wave heroine Josie Cotton’s Kitten Robot Records (you know, she did that song “Johnny, Are You Queer?“).
Taking classic hits like “Duke of Earl” (Gene Chandler), “Earth Angel” (The Penguins), “Mr. Sandman” (The Chordettes/Pat Ballard) and others and deconstructs them, rebuilding them as space-age love songs.
Frontman Wendy Stonehenge says, “A lot of these songs are so ingrained in us that it’s easy to overlook how creative and weird they were in their day. I think I’ve brought some of that weirdness to the forefront.”
I mean, take, for example, the original version of The Cadets’ “Stranded in the Jungle.” It’s already a weird-ass song… It goes from doo wop swing to a psychedelic acid-trip back to a doo wop swing.
Meanwhile, back in the jungle… Wendy keeps the bizarre-itude intact and injects some synths and anxious beats transforming it into a midnight dancefloor anthem.
The first released track on the album, “I Only Have Eyes For You” was originally written for the 1934 film Dames but a cover by The Flamingos made it to #11 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart in 1959. The Flamingos’ version – a slow and languid doo-wop which you might envision being played at the tail end of a sock hop dance when when janitor begins to sweep the floor around the lingering dance partners- grooves along to a slumberous beat.
Candy Whips speeds up the tempo a tad, adding synth textures that create an atmospheric backdrop for Wendy Stonehenge’s gauzy vocals. It’s a fascinating reinvention that updates the song in a way that separates it almost completely from the original.
Candy Whips rebirths the R&B swagger of Gene Chandler’s “Duke of Earl” and infuses it with lush, orchestral layers that are so mesmerizingly and hypnotically robotic that it almost sounds alien. Wendy’s processed vocals almost sound kazoo-like. It’s so stunningly bizarre.
The twinkly reincarnation of “Mr. Sandman” takes the Lawrence Welk-ish original by girlgroup The Chordettes and mutates it into a Casio-coded pop song worthy of Kraftwerk.
An established member of the well-known Northern California glam rock band Glitter Wizard, Wendy Stonehenge formed Candy Whips as a side project to dabble in music that didn’t fit his other band and the world is better for it. A filial bedmate to Devo, Gary Numan, and NEU!, Candy Whips deserve to be huge… and with Moonlight, they’re thisclose to tapping into the electro zeitgeist. For GenX and Boomers who grew up with their parents watching The Andrews Sisters and The Del Rubio Triplets on The Dick Cavett Show, these songs offer a modern twist to the distant past. And that’s the magic that Candy Whips concocts with Moonlight. They offer a nostalgic look back without having to embrace the sour realization that they themselves have become “that old.”
