Album Review: MGMT by MGMT

Most people who leap to claim that MGMT lost their way or wish that they'd return to their roots are those who pine over their blockbuster success that was their debut, Oracular Spectacular. I fall into a different camp. Perhaps it was because my initial exposure to the group was through Flash Delirium, but I consider their follow-up, Congratulations, to be their crowning achievement, near-perfect except for the aimless Lady Dada's Nightmare. So, when I heard that the band was moving even further away from their alt-pop image for a more experimental take, I was hyped.

This album does not live up to said hype. In fact, I don't know if it could live up to any fan's hype, unless they found both previous albums lacking.

The shift in the group's third, self-titled album is one that ditches the prog rock, multitiered songs of Congratulations and the poppy hooks of Oracular Spectacular, going for an odd psych-drone variant. I could have bought into that if the songs were well structured or memorable enough, but instead, many of them fling their ideas at you either too quickly or over a slow-build to nowhere, allowing for little room for building on top of these ideas.

OK, maybe I'm getting too in-depth too early. The best comparison I can make is that this album is their non-mainstream equivalent to Oracular Spectacular. By that, I mean that, while Congratulations had a great flow to it and was evenly paced throughout the album, Oracular Spectacular was front-loaded to a fault, dooming the second half of the album to the insurmountable feat of besting what came before. MGMT faces the same problem, but to a far graver extent.

The album opens with the prog-based Alien Days, the first single from the album. Despite some ill-fitting elements (the off-tune melody in the bridge), the format of the verses really stuck with me. It's a suitable opening in that it eases the gap between Congratulations and this album, but does little to signify what's to come.

While the following song, Cool Song No. 2, doesn't falter much in quality (despite not taking to it much on my first listen, it's grown to become one of my favorites on the album), it's quite the departure from the opener. The heavy beats, the low-register vocals, everything points to an entirely different direction. And that's one of the problems of this album: Despite coming up with a made-up term for the genre of the album, I had trouble figuring out just what sense of identity MGMT was going for on this thing. They cited Aphex Twin as a major source, but I see little to no sign of that influence emerging. If anything (as I'll get into later), it's more of an imitation of Animal Collective than anything.

The next couple of songs, Mystery Disease and Introspection, both seem under-confident for the usually boisterous group. The lacking vocals fit the subject matter of both of these songs, but ultimately lead to them fading into the background once they end (except for Introspection; dear God, I don't know how this song is stuck in my head but I want it out).

Your Life is a Lie, despite the lackluster vocals, won me over due to how cohesively the song works. Imagine this song as a loudspeaker announcement in an idyllic society where everything is going perfectly. Then it all makes sense: the monotone, the pseudo-chanting, the basic beat, and the minimalistic chords all paint a larger picture. If only the rest of the album's songs had this much thought put into muted results, I might have bought into it.

After Your Life is a Lie, the album takes a catastrophic tailspin. A Good Sadness, though I found it interesting the first time around, ends up meandering for its entire length, never really doing much with the cool synth at its core. Astro-Mancy is the closest thing to homage this album comes to, with vocal style and instrumentation taken straight from Animal Collective's playbook. Yet, it fails to make it its own and dissipates from memory the second it ends.

And then there's I Love You Too, Death: the absolute nadir in both the album and MGMT's entire career. I'm OK with slow-build songs. I'm OK with off-kilter instrumentation. But, for whatever reason, this song just pisses me off to an irrational degree. Maybe it's the tonally-deafening recorders of doom. Maybe it's the lack of energy in vocal inflection (again). Maybe it's the fact that it makes the 12-minute Visiting Friends by Animal Collective seem progressive and evolving by comparison (yes, a weak comparison as I actually like that song, but still). Everything in this song just annoys me to an absurd degree. By the time the song finally builds to nothing, ending without a clear resolution, I was ready to just call it quits.

Then Plenty of Girls in the Sea comes on. Despite the unorthodox, out-of-key synth and the skittering beat throughout, something about this song just wins me over. Maybe it's because it includes the best vocals on the album save for Alien Days. Maybe it's the cool time signature swap in the breakdown. Maybe it's the group's best key change in the final verse. I just love everything about this song in ways that I can't adequately explain and it's by far my favorite song on the album.

The album ends on perhaps the most-telling note it could: the schizophrenic, uncertain An Orphan of Fortune. What starts out as a moody, solemn piece turns into a slow stomp, before shifting into a bluesy bridge, then reverting back to the stomp section. I honestly can't pin down my thoughts on this song as a whole, except that it ends leaving me even more mixed than before.

Did I enjoy this album? In parts. Did I dislike this album? In parts. Was I uncertain on how to feel overall? In parts. What does this show about MGMT's identity, as of now? That, it too, is in parts.

Best Songs: Plenty of Girls in the Sea, Cool Song No. 2, Your Life is a Lie
Worst Songs: I Love You Too, Death, Astro-Mancy, An Orphan of Fortune

Movie Review: You're Next

You're Next not only begins as a typical horror movie, but it was also advertised as one. The trailer (linked below) as well as the posters hinted at a film consisting solely of, "Ooh, look at these menacing guys in creepy animal masks who terrify people! This is our main source of fear, guys! This is the best we got!" This mentality was played out long by the time that the modern go-to template for home invasion movies, 2008's The Strangers, was released, so I and most of the moviegoing public wrote this off as yet another knock-off in that field.

Boy, was I wrong.

This may be from a purely immediate reactionary standpoint, but I had a blast with this movie. Similar to my quick realization that I formed an intense emotional bond with The Place Beyond the Pines, You're Next is shaping up to be quite possibly the most fun I've had at the movies this year (with the exception of The World's End). This might just be due to the way my opinion of the movie progressively changed: As the film evolved in style and tone, I found that the trajectory of quality was quite the upswing.

Take, for example, the opening. After a standard home invasion murder complete with obligatory jump-scare, we get a married couple moving into a new house. Check. Introductions to guests who will most likely have stock traits so that not much gets in the way of their deaths. Check. Suspicions that something is not right in the house, only to be quickly shrugged aside, the audience meanwhile fully aware that these assumptions had merit. Check. A family dynamic courtesy of a reunion built around the parents' anniversary. Che- Wait, that's new.

And this is the first sign that this movie is trying something different. From here, the movie uses the standard tropes of the tried-and-true format to not-so-subtly progress into something that's less of a horror film and more of a black comedy (one scene features the parents' daughter crying over the fact that her family thinks she's not as capable of running to get rescue as her siblings) with a horror format. While the family relationship doesn't remain at the forefront for long (it becomes more of an implied driving force for many of the later moments), it paves the way for interesting scenes and concepts.

One scene, in particular, seems like this film's equivalent of the bike scene in The Cabin in the Woods (for the record, that did horror movie deconstruction much better than this film, but I think that this scene works better than that film's solely due to the hilariously brutal shock gore here). The animal mask guys also hint at this movie's approach through the quietly funny way in which they act, cutting through the potential fright their appearances could muster. At one point, one sits down nonchalantly next to a corpse after murdering someone, the humor stemming from his staid stance. They're also on the receiving end of some of the comedy, such as the Home Alone-esque extent to which a couple of them get attacked.

Ultimately, what ends up working the most in this film's favor is it's satirical elements. By the end of the movie's second act, the film drops all notion of the "horror" aspect advertised for a bitterly funny and violent edge. The movie deliberately plays a good amount of this section for comedy, even though the context for these events is anything but. It's also giddily fun and an all-around really enjoyable movie. While not nearly at the same levels of visceral satisfaction as The Cabin in the Woods, the conclusion of this film has a gratifying edge that made me squirm and gasp with glee. Despite the fact that the final event of the movie comes as the result of an impractical judgment on one fairly level-headed character's part, the payoff that results is one of the most insanely awesome abrupt endings since 2011's Hanna.

By the end of it all, I could say so much more about this movie (such as the fact that Sharni Vinson is fantastic and needs to get more roles as a result of this, or how cool the John Carpenter-esque soundtrack is, or about how we need to give the ludicrous number of GODDAMN SLOW-MO SHOTS a rest), but the fun factor ends up being the greatest strength of the film. As soon as the movie ends, complete with the film's main musical motif ("Looking for the Magic" by Dwight Twilley Band, which, trust me, makes a hell of a lot more sense in context) playing over the credits, I wanted to not only immediately buy a DVD copy of the film, but also talk about it to somebody, anybody who would listen. I wouldn't be surprised if this ends up being one of my favorite movies of the year.

Movie Review: In A World...

It's kind of odd and somewhat antiquated, now that I think of it, to picture a movie like this, where voiceovers for trailers are as highly esteemed as they are, being released in 2013. Sure, I do vaguely recall a time when voiceovers in trailers were a big deal and telegraphed to the audience that THE MOVIE WE ARE ADVERTISING IS THE MOST IMPORTANT MOVIE YOU WILL SEE UNTIL THE NEXT MOST IMPORTANT MOVIE. But, after the passing of Don LaFontaine in 2008, the art of epic voiceover work for trailers seemed to subside.

Lake Bell's comedy, In A World..., resurrects the importance of a single powerful voice in the pantheon of movie legend by taking a decidedly striking approach: pitting one woman with a voice that rivals her male counterparts against sexist mores instilled in society. Granted, there's much more complexity and intricacy going on than that concept, but this is the main conflict the film posits a rebuttal to. Bell (in addition to writing and directing) plays Carol, daughter of fictional famous voiceover artist Sam Sotto, who, after being discouraged by her father on the difficulties of breaking into his line of work and being kicked out of his house, goes to stay with her sister and her husband who are themselves going through marital struggles. Other plot threads intertwine, including a fellow employee (Demetri Martin) with a crush on Carol and a rival voiceover star (Ken Marino) under Sotto's wing attempting to bring back the title phrase made famous by LaFontaine.

The film's subject matter has become its main talking point and it's for good reason. How often have you caught yourself thinking that we need equality of the sexes in a career like trailer voiceovers? The movie aims to ferment this notion within those who had never considered it before. But, what could have easily been a preachy message of equality comes across as an original, fresh take on feminist culture. This is most obviously present in one of the final exchanges of dialogue in the film, which eschews radical Amazonian feminism referenced throughout the film for a general instillment of empowerment that could serve as a strong stand-alone argument for the movement as a whole.

Bell's script here is sharp and witty, zipping along at a brisk pace that keeps the plot moving at a natural speed as opposed to rushing through all of the necessary beats. Bell brings an astoundingly human, flawed, yet good-natured turn in the lead role, but Martin's lovable awkwardness and Fred Melamed's realistic stubbornness are noteworthy as well. The supporting cast is excellent here, with Michaela Watkins, Marino, Rob Corddry (yes, this movie is somewhat of a mini-Childrens Hospital reunion, though Marino and Corddry never appear on screen together) Nick Offerman, and Tig Notaro (exceedingly funny in her brief screen-time) among others in bit parts.

Though the script does allow for a lot to happen in a light 93 minutes, it also lets quite a bit go and is, at times, overstuffed. A minor plot thread involving Carol's sister and an Irish director seems to go nowhere after it's resolved with 30 minutes left in the film, aside from a brief reference at the end. Another minor character, a British neighbor, appears in two scenes with hints that she may become important later in the film, but then disappears without a mention.

The movie is also structured in an unorthodox fashion. The first two-thirds of the movie serve as an ensemble piece of sorts, with the big conflict at the end hinted at but not pursued. By the third act, all other side plots are dropped and the main arc of the film becomes the only one. While this isn't necessarily detrimental to the film, it sticks out quite a bit and leads to some awkward shifts in pacing.

But the film gets by on its charm alone. It's a genuinely enjoyable film that has its highs and lows, but I found myself liking it throughout, flaws and all. By combining a noteworthy concept with a overwhelming amount of positivity, In A World... won me over by being the most likable thing a film can be: charming.

About the Future of Current Film Reviews...

About one month ago, after I learned that Blip would be hosting CineMatt Reviews, I made a brief announcement video discussing what that would mean for the sites I would upload videos to. Naturally, since Blip was happy to give CineMatt Reviews a home and YouTube's finicky copyright policy would make future episodes of the show troublesome, CineMatt Reviews would be uploaded to Blip only. What I was uncertain about was where I would post my Gut Reactions to current movies, ultimately choosing to put them onto YouTube only.

Well, I'm reluctant to note that, as of right now, I'm putting Gut Reaction videos on hiatus. This doesn't mean that I'll never do Gut Reactions again or that I won't review current movies. What this does mean is that, for the time being, I won't be doing video reviews for current films.

Now, there are a few reasons for this. First and foremost, I'm not entirely happy with my execution of the concept. Unlike CineMatt Reviews, Gut Reactions are unscripted. As such, I often have a few talking points I want to discuss, but don't know how to exactly phrase them. Someone who's good at improvising on the spot or who's a quick talker could pull this off well. I am neither of those. As such, I try to make myself as verbose as I am in my writing on screen, off the top of my head, which, as you can imagine, is quite clunky when I'm not as quick-witted or sharp-tongued as I'd like to be. Quite simply, I tend to stumble over my words or just pause or stammer trying to get what I want to convey.

Second, even when I do clearly know what I'm trying to say (after a certain number of takes, I have a crude idea of a "script" to stick to in my head), I'm not sure if video reviews for these are the way to go.  I'll admit, my videos could just as easily be podcasts (even though that still doesn't solve my verbal arthritis). They sound like written reviews being read aloud... albeit still in the process of being written.

Third, while I like the concept of my reviews, there's a variation on it that seems to work better than the default one I have right now: that of unscripted group reviews immediately after having seen these movies (i.e. Team Snob's Midnight Reviews). However, most of my close friends are not as "cinematically-inclined" as I am (to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, the only movie I saw this year with them was Iron Man 3). Now, if in the future, my friends ever want to get in front of the camera and talk about movies with me, I'd be more than happy to do so. In fact, I wouldn't put it out of the question that, if a movie really demands I do so in a way that only video can accomplish, I'll hop in front of the camera to do a Gut Reaction video in the future.

Fourth (this one solidified my opinion), I haven't been feeling as strongly about my Gut Reaction videos up until this point as I have been with CineMatt Reviews. CineMatt Reviews demands that I use video, taking advantage of editing, in-depth commentary, and visual representation of my opinions in a way that Gut Reactions just can't match. Not to sound too cautious, but I do feel that, at a certain point, as I try to stay on schedule with CineMatt Reviews (yes, I am actually trying to stick to a reasonable timetable with these videos), making Gut Reaction videos for every current movie I see will hinder my progress on those primary efforts.

With this final point, I asked myself a question that eventually made up my mind: Do I want to put in the effort to what amounts to so-so, simplistic videos when the same amount of effort can create fleshed-out and analytically written reviews? The answer, when I phrased the question that way, was "no".

But, this doesn't mean the end for my reviews of current films. On the contrary, I'm taking something that could use improvement and use it as a building block for further experience. This blog, in addition to the irregular album review here and there (as I have been wont to do), will now host written reviews on current films as I see them. The two most recent films I have seen (In A World... and You're Next) further cemented this choice of mine as they are both movies I want to exactly phrase my opinions on rather than desperately grasp for the proper words over the span of five minutes.

What I hope this will accomplish is that it'll improve my writing, both on film and elsewhere, while giving me an outlet for my opinions on current movies. CineMatt Reviews will be my primary effort video-wise; this blog will be my primary source for written efforts.

So, to put a long-winded explanation of my reasoning short: Gut Reaction videos are being put to the side for now (but could make a return at some point). Written reviews of current films on this blog will take their place. CineMatt Reviews are going to be my main video efforts. With that in mind, I'll try my damnedest to make both of these the best that they can be.

(Film reviews for In A World... and You're Next will be posted soon.)

Album Review: UFO by Need New Body

Lately, I've been getting somewhat desperate in terms of music that I latch onto. It's less that any song that's downright catchy leads me on an epic search for the rest of that artist's efforts, but more that if a song by a random artist, unbeknownst to me, that I've never heard of before suddenly enters my world at full force and I find it impossible to drive it out, that I search out the rest of what whoever that may be has to offer.

And this is what led me to Need New Body.

Backstory time! A few weeks back, Anthony Fantano (better known as "theneedledrop") did an online DJ set on turntable.fm. Curious as to what he would play, I dropped by for a few minutes and listened in. Aside from a familiar song from Minor Threat, I had never heard any of what Fantano played on that show before. And none of it really seemed to grab me. With the exception of one deceptively, insanely catchy song that is the epitome of an ear worm.

This song, with its unbelievable combination of electronica, banjo, strings, gypsy rock, and Frank Black-esque vocals, stuck with me for a long, long time. It was my go-to song when bored and unable to find a song. It became a musical drug unlike any other, the urge to return to it so strong I couldn't resist its charms for more than a day. And, more than anything else, it became a musical quandary unlike any other.

I believe that, if you try hard enough, you can categorize any music into genres. This isn't necessarily a good thing (lumping multiple things that only vaguely sounds like each other into the same field, yada yada), but it helps those lost in the myriad of music available at one's fingertips. Here, however, was the first time I've been unable to come up with a genre that even remotely describes that song above. The group's Wikipedia page described them as "avant-garde," but avant-garde music isn't this... catchy. Or this compulsively danceable.

It eventually drove me so obsessively insane that I had no choice but to seek out the full album. And, may I say, that "avant-garde" label certainly fits UFO as a whole.

The opening track, Giggle Bush Meets CompUSA, is a clear indicator of what you're getting yourself into: what begins as a simple melody devolves into a series of crazy bleeps and bloops that is too sudden to even call jarring. It's jagged in every sense of the word, but funny for how long it ends up going on. But, then, we get one of the most compelling tracks of the album, Hot Shot. After a squawky start, there's an incredibly simple yet delirious banjo(?) part that acts as the song's central melody. And, if you didn't realize from the previous track that the group has a crazy sense of humor, the track here fades before the melody is hilariously shouted at the top of the vocalist's lungs and the instrumentation lankily comes back into play. Suffice it to say, it's one of the more cohesive and noteworthy tracks on the album.

Since there are 23 songs on this album and many of them never evolve past simple ideas, I'll touch on the ones worth mentioning instead of doing my typical track-by-track business.

Let's start with the good. The main "single"(?) of the album is Beach, a ridiculous, parodical anthem for the oft-implemented setting in the same vein as America, Fuck Yeah (despite being released a year before that song, with the ubiquity of the latter, the comparison is inevitable). No, really.

That list towards the middle of the song should set off some bells of familiarity in those of you who have heard America, Fuck Yeah. The fact that it concludes with "Race wars/I'm hanging out/The youth will rule/O.D./Totally/Awesome" should tip off anyone who hasn't spotted that by this point. Also, I will forever be compelled to randomly yell out "Robfish!" whenever anyone ever mentions a pufferfish ever again.

Red as a Bone is completely uninteresting musically, but notable for its droning recitation of a list that goes on for nearly four minutes, essentially a musical representation of the cake sphere from Portal. So, why is this mentioned in the "good" section of the review? Merely for the last 30 seconds, which shrugs off the length of the song in an overacted manner. Ox also sounds boring on paper; it's a single running melody that continually stops and starts back up again, but, for whatever reason, works and never gets boring. Perhaps it's due to the progressing instrumentation that overlays it approximately halfway into the track (something that the horribly dull two-minute-long I Know lacks).

Pow Pow gets by mostly on sheer diversity and its odd combination of elements, packing in a xylophone fill, low bass tones, a piano line and simple vocals in a minute and a half. Shark Attack is a compelling mix of hammer-ons and pull-offs and a constant "One! Two! Three!" shout that is one of the more exciting and memorable tracks. And, speaking of memorable, Pen hits the mark for its incredibly catchy chorus ("Pen, pen, pen/Where's my pen?") and darkly comedic verses about the pen's connection to the narrator's relatives (including a sick grandma and a cousin with one arm).

But, if there's one song worth mentioning over all others, it's Show Me Your Heart. If you listened to the link up above, you know why this song caught my attention and urged me to listen to the whole album. Its hybrid approach to numerous styles, humorous lyrics, memorable vocals, and overall completeness (more so than practically every other song on the album) is a near-perfect array of obtuseness. And, if the rest of the album was as fleshed out as this song, perhaps I'd like it more than I do.

This is due to the fact that, as you may have guessed from my description of the album, so many songs (if you can call them that) simply exist as brief ideas or interludes and are never fleshed out beyond their simplest concepts. This would be fine if they served simply as bridges between two fully developed songs, but, more often than not, they just lead into yet another bizarre yet brief track. After a while, the constant detours into acoustic ballads (Moondear), piano stings (Make Gay Love Not War, Coffee Shop Girl, Pt. 2), banjo music (Magic Finger), radio parodies (Dr. Spliffin's Food Drive), and feedback (Apple Snake) make the relief of a full-fledged, honest-to-God song that much more worthwhile. These diversions then cease to be amusing or interesting, instead dragging out the album beyond it's necessary threshold of tolerability. I know that this album was made with a "kitchen sink" mentality, but sometimes less is more and the fat needs to be trimmed.

Which brings me to the album's lowest point, only four tracks in. Popfest is banality incarnate: a simple bass line, a single line of lyrics, and random distortion for nearly three minutes before the distortion grows without becoming any more immediate or frantic. It meanders, it lingers, and makes me pine for the dull yet brief oddities that pepper the rest of the album.

Unlike the opening track, which has the element of surprise in its favor, closing song Turns Pillars Into Trees is a disappointing slinky bass line that just suddenly ends. And that's it. That's the end of the album.

"Frustrated" is the best way to describe my reaction to UFO. Based on my initial love of Show Me Your Heart and how much I enjoy the tracks that I ended up liking, I wanted, and was, in fact, quite ready to embrace the weirdness I was prepared to hear. What disappointed me was how boring most of it ended up sounding. Even after only one listen through, I found myself more compelled to revisit individual songs rather than the album as a whole, which speaks negatively to the album's overall smooth flow. Yet, if there's one thing I can take away from this album, it's that it certainly traversed the a wide range, in its genres and styles definitely, but more prominently in quality, from the excellent to the dull to (more often than anything else) the mediocre.

Best Songs: Show Me Your Heart, Hot Shot, Beach
Worst Songs: Popfest, Turn Pillars Into Trees, I Know

Mini Album Review: Threat Level Ultra by Ghidoragh

If there's one genre of music I really want to get into more than I already have, it's hardcore punk. Maybe it's just because, so far, I've listened to all the right stuff (Bad Brains, Minor Threat, etc.), but what I've heard is enough to convince me on the entirety of the genre. Thus, a random article on Kotaku became a blessing in disguise when it allowed me to discover an awesome contemporary addition to the genre. (The article mentioned the cover, reminiscent of an old-school video game cover and its extravagant physical packaging, but mentioned little to nothing about the album itself.)

Ghidoragh, if my understanding of the group is correct, is a hardcore punk outfit from New Zealand. I've been unable to find out how long they've been around, but perhaps the only existing YouTube video I could find seems to date them back to 1999. And it claims to be a reunion show. I honestly have no idea when the group got started (I doubt it's the same group, because some of the band's official pages call this EP their debut) but, no matter if this is their first effort or their thirtieth, one thing's certain: this EP kicks all kinds of ass.

The first thing that has to be noted is the length of this thing. Staying true to their roots, Threat Level Ultra clocks in at just under nine minutes over the course of eight tracks. No track is longer than a minute and a half, and I'll be damned if the group doesn't pack in some serious punch in record time.

The first track demonstrates exactly what this group is going for: Fledgling Industry is a light-hearted, parodical perspective into the business world with the driving line of "One hundred million dollars/One hundred million dollars/Business, business." There's a lot to get psyched for in this 48-second track, and as it seamlessly segues into First Contact, we get an even catchier line that jumps from 15 to 16 to 18 to 20 to 30 to 40 to 50 to 1000. (I can't quite make out what comes after each of the numbers, but it doesn't make it any less noteworthy.) For all of the hardcore punk I've listened too, very little of it has been enough to make me hum it nonchalantly during mundane activities (with the exception of Sailin' On by Bad Brains). Not only does this rock, but it's surprisingly compulsively listenable.

Suncrash offers the first of many retro-inspired audio clips, this one appearing from what sounds like a sci-fi film, as well as more of the same in terms of music. Bonus Level is a neat little lo-fi epilogue to this song taken from what sounds like either live footage or a raw recording of rehearsal footage.

Goop on the Perimeter has one of the most bafflingly funny audio clips from what sounds like an old PC game with a voiceover that sounds like John Cleese, culminating with the line "Now... masturbate!" The album's sole instrumental, it starts fast-paced like it's predecessors before coming down into a sludgy stomp that is hypnotically intoxicating.

Spiders is another light-hearted, fast 'n' heavy romp that plays like a punk version of something from Need New Body. It's a fun little non-sequitur of a song with lines like "Spiders, spiders everywhere/Spiders, spiders in my hair." And it ends with yet another cool audio clip, this one coming from what sounds like an old grindhouse movie trailer.

Threat Level Ultra is probably the most epic track on the EP, beginning with a siren wail before a slow opening and going through several progressions too numerous to note in writing before ending as soon as it began. It never repeats, never becomes dull, and is continuously interesting. It's an awe-inspiring track simply in its nature and really shows off the group's potential better than any other.

Dirt Dicks (yes, that's the actual name of the track) begins in one of the most oddly fitting ways I've ever heard a song start; it opens with an audio clip of Bill Cosby explaining an experience he had drumming with Sonny Stitt before effortlessly working in a count-in to the actual song. And it works. Flawlessly. The song itself fits the typical hardcore punk vibe more than the rest of the EP, working in nihilism and pure unfiltered energy (as opposed to previous songs about business, contact with aliens, militarism, and space) before ending with more of what we've come to expect: the climactic ending audio clip from the game The Chaos Engine.

As much as I've enjoyed writing this review for this short but sweet taste of the band's output, it really can't compare to hearing the actual thing. So, regardless of if you're a fan of hardcore punk or new to the genre, take a listen to the EP over on the group's Bandcamp page (linked below). Best of all, if, like me, you really enjoy this collection of music, you can download it at a price of your own choosing. I'd really like to see more from this group, so any bit of contribution helps. I really dug this small taste of what Ghidoragh can offer and definitely look forward to whatever they put out next.

Best Songs: Threat Level Ultra, Fledgling Industry, First Contact
Worst Songs: It's a 9 minute, 8 track EP. Does it fucking matter if there's anything worth being called "worst"? (Not that anything on here even comes close deserves that label.)

Album Review: ...Like Clockwork by Queens of the Stone Age

As someone who professes to be a critic, it's commonplace assumption that this means you need to find something to criticize in everything. I'll admit, this has been true for most of the stuff I've reviewed since I've never claimed anything to be "perfect," but...

GOD. DAMN. This album. I mean, it's not necessarily perfect, but it was certainly the best experience I had listening to music this year, in the last few years, and possibly one of the best of all time. I've already been hyping the hell out of this album internally and externally, put out two videos about it in anticipation, and probably drove off a few of my so-called "friends" on Facebook posting about this, but it somehow met and exceeded all of my expectations. A music nerd needs to be able to obsessively geek out over something every now and then, and that now and then is right now.

...Like Clockwork did the impossible: take a band I merely had a passing interest in due to one fantastic album and turned them into bona fide rockstars. Songs for the Deaf was the quintessential rock album of the last decade and, as of right now, ...Like Clockwork is the standout of the genre for this decade. Every song is fleshed out and with a sound of its own (not unlike Deaf), but unlike that past entry, every song seems to have its own emotional core. Sure, Six Shooter was a funny little throwaway song, but it didn't have the melancholic breakdown of album opener Keep Your Eyes Peeled, wherein the album's nastiest song turns into a lament on fading optimism. Right off the bat, you can tell that ...Like Clockwork is going for something special and of its own, unlike anything that Queens of the Stone Age  has done before. Many have attributed this to frontman Josh Homme's near-death experience following knee surgery, and there's a certain mortality in his lyrics that rock music hasn't touched upon since Bruce Springsteen's The Rising.

By now, it sounds like I'm laying the praises on heavily, but an album that can rock as hard as this and holds so many more layers than its peers deserves to be made an example of. The melancholy is brought to the forefront with I Sat By The Ocean, a title that conjures weariness and pausing as the world passes you by. The guitar riff here is foregrounded, but in a muted, expressive manner that allows for a line comparing the speaker and the subject to "passing ships in the night" to evolve into "crashing ships in the night." Something that could merely be a subtle shift instead ends up a literal wreck. When was the last time you heard something like this in rock music?

Just when the album looks to be settling into a groove, though, it ramps things up in terms of both quality and content. Even with an opening song that details the view from Hell, when the first words out of Homme's mouth are "I want God to come and take me home," you're in for an entirely different beast. Thus, The Vampyre Of Time And Memory marks the turning point of the album. Though it lacks the intensity of the two previous tracks, the melancholy and emotion overwhelms to the point of sensory overload. It sinks in that this is what the album is going for, this is the type of album Homme intended to make, especially with the title track following in its footsteps at the album's conclusion.

The streak of great songs continues with If I Had A Tail, wherein Homme rattles off some of the album's best lyrics about the state of the world and his own being. What the meaning behind the song lacks, the excellent instrumentation and clever writing makes up for, giving the tune its own sense of sheer funk rock bravado. My God Is The Sun follows suit and wins simply for being an exciting, exhilarating rock song. (My God, when was the last time we had one of those?) Even with some jarringly out-of-place lyrics ("I don't know what time it was/I don't wear a watch," comedic drum effect optional), the song never lets up and succeeds merely on the steam on which it runs.

And then there's Kalopsia. What starts off as slow introspection turns into a schizophrenic back-and-forth between Homme and guest vocalist Trent Reznor before the unhinged come-down. Mixing equal parts Bowie-era glam rock and some of the heaviest power chords on the album, the duality of the song works in tandem with excellent lyrics such as "forget the rat in the race, we'll choke-chain them all."

Fairweather Friends works in a similar duality, tying a hard rock sensibility that most of the album has going for it with a driving piano riff led by Elton John. It's one of the more fun tracks on the album (even with the pessimistic lyrics) and is elevated by an ending so unexpected that it had me laughing purely from shock value.

It makes sense then that Smooth Sailing should follow this song, as it continues that "couldn't care less" attitude from Fairweather Friends with a cocky stride unrivaled (expertly mirroring the title). Again, the lyricism here is top-notch; where else are you going to find the line "I will blow my load over the status quo?"

What follows is what could easily be called the album's centerpiece: the epic, moody I Appear Missing. I've already talked in length about what makes this song so special, but, to add to the absolutely brilliant, striking lyrics that run throughout this thing, the second half of the song, which results in one of the most cathartic musical conclusions in recent memory, is interminably stunning. One could write essays about the depth of the lyrics, the marvelous instrumentation, or the fascinating structure of it all, even perhaps how all three intertwine in a way most musicians wouldn't even begin to dream about. Regardless, it's by far the most alluring cut from the album.

The band closes the album in a quiet fashion, with the title track detailing nerve-wracked thoughts of the past and coming to terms with the present. The barebones piano of the song's first half is haunting, allowing for reflection of all things that passed, before the most muted instrumental backing on the album comes in. Given the mood of the rest of the album, lyrically and instrumentally, it's somewhat fitting that ...Like Clockwork ends in a state of melancholic understatement rather than a show-stopping finale.

This album is a rarity in music. Every track has something worth talking about, greater depth and more nuanced instrumentation than most music currently out there. The band gives the album its all (especially the drums, which add a crucial layer to every song and serve as the backbone to the stellar lyrics and blistering guitar riffs). It's been a while since I've found something to like in every moment of an album; there's not a wasted moment, not a single expendable piece. I'm simply amazed that an album like this can simultaneously satisfy visceral rock urges and analytical tendencies, and, more importantly, simply exist.

(Author's Note: This late review is due to me ordering the Deluxe Double LP of the album, which suffered some delays. However, it was definitely worth the wait. The vinyl was in excellent condition, as to be expected, but the real winner of this packaging is the 20-page art booklet built into the package. The absolutely gorgeous artwork from Boneface coupled with complete lyric sheets makes this a must-own for those who want the complete package. Hands-down: this is one of the greatest vinyl packagings I've ever seen as a record collector.)

Best Songs: I Appear Missing, My God Is The Sun, The Vampyre Of Time And Memory
Worst Songs: For just once, would anyone be upset if I put nothing here? I really can't justify calling anything on this album "worst."