Mumps, Etc.

This Band is Weird…and I love it
This band is really out there but I like it. I have a recording studio and listen to their records on my studio speakers and this record really jumps out at me. So much to listen to. So much going on. The sonic pallet is rich and pleasing and interesting.

another quality collection from Why?
I really only became acquainted with (and fell in love with) the music of Why? with 2008’s Alopecia, a masterpiece in its own right. Since then I’ve made it my business to complete my Why? collection, acquiring their other full-length albums, plus a couple EPs. Since then, I also found much to love on their subsequent Eskimo Snow set. So it was with great anticipation that I waited several months for this one, and the wait, it turns out, was well worth it. The instrumentation and production are perhaps even better than on the aforementioned albums, and as always, the remarkable lyrical offerings from Yoni Wolf consistently amaze, amuse, and frankly make my head spin at times. His verses are so jam-packed and intricately constructed that it sometimes takes a couple listens to get everything he’s saying in a single sentence, which is often the same thing as an entire verse. And as usual, the messages range from deeply personal (almost embarrassingly so) to brilliantly comic, but each song is also a unique and precise insight into the human condition. Put a gun to my head and force me to pick favorite tracks, and I would offer as my choices Jonathan’s Hope, Strawberries, White English, Sod in the Seed, Distance, Paper Hearts, and As a Card… but for sure, there is not a track on this collection that is anything less than excellent. It’s approximately the only thing I’ve been listening to for the past two weeks…

Love WHY?
I have always loved the band and the . Sounds great on vinyl. Great music and crazy artwork on this one.

No Alopecia but not as bad as Pitchfork would lead you to believe
Pitchfork abhorred this one. An agonizing review, in fact, which led into a deep and frankly pretty intriguing and adroit dissection of the anatomy of a failed album that unfortunately did little to touch exactly what Why? did right. Call me a Yani Wolf purist, but I really like most anything that man does. This is not as brilliant as Alopecia. It is not even as good as Elephant Eyelash (waterfalls will probably never be eclipsed, nor speech bubbles). But gosh darn if it doesn’t try. The rhymes are serviceable and darkly snide, and the backing is great. Honestly I find myself listening to this album again and again on Spotify but have yet to shell out the cash to purchase it–which I suppose sums up my feelings on it. By no means is it the reprehensible trash Pitchfork made it out to be. But is it worth 15 bucks? Probably not. Worth a listen, however, if only to hear one of the lyrical geniuses of our age (there I said it) working just a hair outside of his comfort zone and making the most of it.

Yoni Wolf is the new Bob Dylan. Yes, I know I only say that in order to get him into bed, but he being heterosexual refuses even my more efluvious advances. Let’s just say “Mumps, etc.” is well up to their usual standard. Every track is a hit! A loping hip-hop sway pervades every one. Lyrics obscure, maybe personal, most evade me yet captivate me with their pertinence, their glimpse into another American, bourgeois, domestic, struggling to get out, world. Tunes strong and captivating. The Jews have always cannibalised other peoples music and broadened it’s appeal so here Yoni & the boys and girl take the black man’s rap and by making it more melodic, watering it down of course, make it accessible to a wider audience. They bring rap/hip-hop in from the harsh mean streets and domesticate it laying it on the couch of the expensive New York psychiatrist who while exposing their innermost feelings protects them from the gutter. Although it hasn’t got a driving rock’n’roll rhythm or a fantasy americana landscape buy this album it let’s you eavesdrop on a world that isn’t yours yet speaks of yours. One track sound like it’s recorded inside a wrist-watch, now tell me what other band is doing that today. The album of 2012, no contest.

bof malheureusement pas à la hauteur des autres albums qui eux étaient parfaits, le single était la seule chanson “dynamique”