They Might Be Giants
Dial-A-Song Round Up! pt. 5
"Glean" (the final track from the album of the same name) is a delightful cha cha in hell, with a dusty, post-apocalyptic feel. A fantastically simple video.
"ECNALUBMA" shares some similarity with "Unpronounceable", but still stands strong on its own, very strong. I can see this coming up in discussions for inclusion on Glean, but I can also see it making the a Glean b-side collection, maybe even as the first track. The lyrics and horns are excellent, almost too perfectly TMBG.
Next up, a cover of The Record's 1978 single, "Starry Eyes". Don't know what to say here, it's a great, straight up cover of a nice little punk gem.
Finally, a month after its release, all of Glean has been released on DAS, now we can move on. Sorry if that came across a bit bitchy, but, I don't know, when the release date rolled around and they kept posting songs from it on DAS, I kept thinking it was a wasted opportunity. Anyway, despite my inner turmoil, "Aaa" is a really fantastic song. I think of it as Linnell's response to Flansburgh's "Music Jail", mainly because of its freneticism. And I stand by my assessment. I also love any song with built in yelling parts, and this song is mostly built in yelling parts. Hope to see this live. The video, while nothing special, is a nice callback to the very first for "I Wasn't Listening".
This month's TMBG concert was The Else, and it was fantastic. Review forthcoming.
Nine Inch Nails
Um. Well. It appears that the Fight Club musical is happening.
In other news not directly associated with They Might be Giants, I spent some time this month with the new Blur, The Magic Whip. Normally, the way I experience Blur albums is to sift through and find which songs sound enough like Gorillaz that I can delude myself into thinking that there still is a Gorillaz, and that these are just, sort of, b-sides or tracks from some unreleased album. I did not do that with Whip, however, because almost the whole thing is fantastic.*
The slightly detuned and delightfully demented piano set against the happy sway of "Ong Ong", the straight up punk rock of "I Broadcast", the gloomy grandeur of "Pyongyang", the summery dub of "Ghost Ship", and the infectious nature of "Lonesome Street" and "Go Out"...this album is fucking great. Certainly enough to hold me over until FUCKING GORILLAZ RETURNS LATER THIS YEAR, DAMON, DO YOU FUCKING HEAR ME?
* Although I did add a song or two to my "This Could Be A Gorillaz Album" playlist.
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