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People who can't rap shouldn't and programmers with some degree of ability shouldn't bother enlisting those tired vocalists when they aren't needed. Point in case: Todd Drootin of Books on Tape makes some mildly entertaining, low-end electronic fuzz dependent on bass and drums and then decides that it must be too boring to stand alone.
Melissa Dungan enters this scene and proceeds to rap like a 12 year old girl obsessed with coming off as "old school." It's a truly sad scenario of adolescent proportions until Dungan stops rapping and starts singing some reasonably tolerable lines variously concerned with such topics as Donnie Darko and shoes of different colors. The EP is five tracks plus five remixes; one remix is provided for each original track. The Master Cylinder remix of "Chartreuse" is actually quite good and is worth a few listens or perhaps it could serve as a nice addition to a mix CD for long, relaxing drives. While there are plenty of groove-filled rhythms pulsing through most of these tracks, the vocals always end up cutting through them like a chainsaw to bobbing rolls of fat. It's messy and irritating because those rolls of fat are mesmerizing and fun to watch while they last. Eventually the remixes stand out and above the original tracks, but only because the lyrics are buried deeper in the mix and because the remixes aren't trying hard to be surprising. They simply move along at their own pace and provide a continuous mood and steady rhythm. There's nothing but standard fare going on here; the price is pretty nice for a ten song EP, but it's depressing that only two or three of those ten songs are worth paying attention to.
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Songs like "California" and "Everybody's Song" are instantaneously catchy, and it doesn't take many listens to easily sing along. Finding a cool comfort in a quieter approach are songs like the haunting re-recorded "Silver Rider," originally released on the "Murderer" single, and "Cue the Strings," which could easily be a nod to the Secret Name version of "Will the Night" with its use of (no surprise here) strings. Towards the end, the album lightens up with two fictitious autobiographies, "When I Go Deaf," where Alan sings about all the benefits of going deaf, and "Death of a Salesman," where he faces the doubts that nearly all musicians have at one point in their life.
Low have done a complete 180 degree turn on The Great Destroyer, as their deeper subjects tackled are the loudest rock tunes and the sillier lighter things are the quiet, slower numbers. The biggest criticism people have been giving (and all it takes is a few web searches or to be signed up on an email list to witness) has been "this isn't the Low I love." As music listeners, we're all guilty to some degree of taking a certain "ownership" of music, especially when it isn't multi-platinum hitmakers that everybody in your family or office knows. (Oh, that's "Jon" music they say around me, and I'm sure many people reading this have had the same thing happen at the home or office.) My criticism isn't with the musical choices the band took, as Low still sincerely dedicate themselves to perfection within the pop/rock framework, but with the production. Dave Fridman, the overrated knob twiddler for Flaming Lips who nerdy hipsters drool over, has seemed to fail to keep up with Low's enthusiasm. Layers of distorted guitars and beefed up drums get out of hand and sound like they're clipping at overdriven levels. If they wanted to sound amateurishly distorted, then they've done a good job, but there are moments on the album that sound way too accidentally muddy. Regardless, this is an album that I have grown a great fondness for in the short time I've been listening.
It's not entirely unexpected from Low, but it's easy to see that executed in such a bold contrast to their trademark can go either way: treasure or trash. This album is an elephant in the livingroom and people will undoubtedly have a hard time getting around it without an opinion.
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