Fatalist Monthly 1987: "This music should be played in every elevator and grocery store. Crispy, crispy Barrett damage! Sounds like Robert Calvert ala Hawkwind! Coz makes about 99% of all Austin bands irrelevant. I would love to hear what this guy could do in a studio but with all the Glitch mentality people around it might take awhile."
-- it took thirteen years and nobody noticed in spite of my extensive flier campaign! (Coz)
Austin Chronicle 1987: "Coz pillages the right sources, mostly early Bowie and Syd Barrett. He may lack in skill, but he has a wonderfully strange mind. A mind that comes up with songs like Are you gonna be my bride or are you just gonna be the other end of my orgasm? and We're gonna ruin about ten different people can't be all bad. Classic weirdness. A younger Roky?" (D.N.L.)
-- this review was part of the Chronicles "Best Christmas Presents" !!! I didn't even send him a tape! (Coz)
Skin and Bones 1988: "A lot of the songs sound like Mediterranean punk from Hell. The man writes killer ballads."
Disaster 1989: "Coz the Shroom is this weirdo visionary from Austin Texas who records frequently in his bedroom accompanying his prophecy with shattered guitar."
Rollerderby 1992: "A lot of reviews focus on his zany personality. No one seems to notice that Coz has a great voice! He's a crooner." (Lisa Carver)
-- Lisa always says the greatest things! (Coz)
Texas Beat 1993: (best unsigned bands) "sign this guy and make lots of money!"
-- This came out of nowhere. I didn't send them a tape or anything! (Coz)
Austin Chronicle 1995: "On Japanese Tank Division Song dg pops out the catchiest bass line you ever did hear, and former Suckdog/Carver collaborator/fake fur activist Coz throws down with a succinct but satisfying guitar fit in the middle of this amoral sermonette..." (Cindy Widner)
Apathy, Drugs and Driving 1995: "Japanese Tank division song, despite the great title, starts off weakly but then kicks in with cool skronkin' guitar leads that give this song some teeth!" (Chuck)
Shelf Life 1995: "Iron Heads music is catchy. One thinks of Elvis here gyrating to this spaced out ecstatic beat... Japanese Tank Division Song the music repeats a bit too much. but the tempo and punctuation, volleys, and blasts all fit together great. I give a 9 to this song." (Leon Sultenfuss)
Austin Chronicle 2000: "Ever since savant toy pianist Danny Johnston left Austin for serener pastures, squeezing purity out of Austin music is like getting butter from a duck. Fortunately, we still have Coz the Shroom. This particular party celebrates the founding Girl Robot and Lisa Suckdog collaborator's first ever CD release, Nun Creme, punctuating a 20-plus-year career of about 72,000 homemade cassette releases with a happy l'il exclaimation point! And while some may wonder what the point of such fortitude is in our fickle musicle landscape, fans of brothers from other planets like Beefheart, Sun Ra, the Bee Gees, Syd Barrett, Ziggy, Iggy, and Brant Bingamon will see it all with a certain clarity." (Kate X Messer)
Austin Chroncile 2001: It's neither good to tempt the fates nor anger the gods. Legend, lore, fables, Norse mythology, and tracts of faith tell us so, as does Austin's Coz the Shroom. At least he and his pals have been trying to get us to listen to his particular take on whacked-out truth for the past decade or so. On the hot, new Fractured Fairytales, by the Girl Robots, led by Coz's Bad News Bingo-editing wife Dame Diana Garcia, Seņor Shroom sings of Dracula's Dog, Monkey Boys, and Liquid Plutonium Centers, all of which dovetail nicely into the band's often horrifying Hawkwindian tendencies. Missing this 8pm CD release party would be like reading a fairy tale where nobody lives happily ever after. (Kate X Messer)
November 16, 2001:
Fractured Fairy Tales (Chihuahua Pit Entertainment) Edward Everett Horton, known and loved as narrator of "Fractured Fairy Tales" on The Bullwinkle Show, better watch his happy arse if this local crew ever rolls into the land of make-believe in their Mystery Machine. Although it took six years to emerge from the womb, the Girl Robots' CD debut is an iconoclastic mind-rocker aerodynamically designed to undulate wildly in the skewed noodles of the wonderfully weird. Led by longtime Austin underground fixtures Coz the Shroom and Diana Garcia, the Robots deftly swing the mantle of fellow travelers like the Red Krayola, Hawkwind, Half Japanese, Bongwater, and TFUL 282 to create a homemade psychedelic space-punk bouillabaisse that revels in perverse fairy tale imagery. The emphasis tracks here are "These Are the Last Days of Doc Vomit and the Shithead Gang on Earth" and "Nikki's Got a Robot Hand," seemingly heartfelt homages to Saturday morning Krofft vehicles that never made it out of development. Alternately, "Mob on Our Hands" and "Thug" sound like early-Eighties punk rock anthems marinated in faraway flange instead of frothing feedback. On "Drowning Cricket," Shroom's melodramatic vibrato melds with a lilting organ riff to build a perfectly morbid lullaby. Nevertheless, only the bravest of dreamers would consider any of Fractured Fairy Tales bedtime listening. If you fall asleep with the headphones on, don't blame us when weeping bubo-laden puffins swoop out of the sky and take you away.