Today, we're eating everything with spoons in honor of Spoon's new album "They Want My Soul," which is kind of like UPS: it delivers. But instead of reviewing it with sacchrine, flowery adjectives and grandiose metaphors, we're just gonna tell you what we learned.
Today, we're eating everything with spoons in honor of Spoon's new album "They Want My Soul," which is kind of like UPS: it delivers. But instead of reviewing it with sacchrine, flowery adjectives and grandiose metaphors, we're just gonna tell you what we learned.
Rooster's Rating: 8/10. Impressive dalliance into the modern era for an established band, but we weren't craving something impressively produced from them as much as we wanted something unexpected.
1. This is their eighth album since 1993.
Spoon isn't the most committed band out there today; despite being around for 22 years, they've only released eight albums. Many of Spoon's members are involved in side projects like Divine Fits and Wolf Parade, and so Spoon isn't always the favorite son. That comes across in They Want My Soul, where the easily-identifiable melodies and somewhat safe drum parts make it evident that Spoon's comeback wasn't the only thing they've been thinking about since they released their last album in 2010.
2. There's really no substitute for 60's garage guitar with a catchy piano harmony.
There's a reason that sound is the foundation of rock n' roll, and if you forgot that, "I Just Don't Understand" will explain it to you. Spoon perfects the deceptively simple art of arranging a marriage between no-frills guitar and saloon-style piano all throughout the album, but the sound belongs to them, not to the phylum "Rock."
3. The '90s called. They want you to hook them up with the '00s.
Spoon's always had a '90s garage-rock thing going on, and there's something about the timbre and rasp of lead singer Britt Daniel's voice that embodies that era. But with Soul, Spoon has added a modern component to that tried-and-true sound. But that's not uncommon these days, with new bands like Widowspeak channeling shoegaze queen Mazzy Star and How to Dress Well, Shy Girls, and Jessie Ware paying tribute to '90s R&B. Spoon's album is no different, riding off that trend by retaining the matter-of-fact cadence and stereo separation of their earlier '90s offerings, but modernizing it with more emotionally diverse lyrics and blatantly synthetic instrumentation. The only difference between other bands capitalizing on the sound of the last years of the 20th century and Spoon, is that on their new album, Spoon is exploiting their own sound, not someone else's.
4. LCD Soundsystem is about as contagious as Ebola (very).
The album concludes with Spoon's danciest, catchiest track we can think of, "New York Kiss." It rides a building, dance-rock groove that we daresay could have been produced by James Murphy. "Outlier" is another track off the album that exhibits vaguely LCD Soundsystem-like qualities like shimmering synth, groovy bass, and a lot of "na na na na."
5. Maintaining your sound while simultaneously evolving is tricky, but not if you're Spoon
Spoon's career has been gloriously devoid of any failed experiments with electronica or rap-rock, but that doesn't mean they sound the same as they did in 1993. They Want My Soul bares the same millennial college radio sound that Spoon's made their own, but, unlike their previous albums, it reveals a little studio help. In fact, Flaming Lips collaborator Dave Fridmann oversaw four tracks off the album, and peppered in some signature synth flourishes, weird MIDI sounds, controlled staccato guitars, and psychedelic fuzz that compliments, not overwhelms. For Spoon, all it takes is a touch of fresh perspective to update a decades-old sound.
6. There's comfort in predictability
Despite Spoon's ability to evolve upon themselves, we still detected an air of predictability in Soul. The chord progressions, the melodies, Britt Daniel's highly identifiable voice, all of it came together in a way that made us feel like deja vu. Not in a bad way per say, but when a band has been around since 1993, there's some degree of reinvention you crave from them. And that brings up a really good question about bands: do they stay true to their voice for as long as they can, or do they invent something entirely new? Neither option is better than the other, but we have to say that Spoon's latest release left us lusting after the latter.
That being said, Soul is comfortable. When you hear it, you don't go "Who the hell is this?" You know it's a Spoon album. And if you're in the market for comfort, you're in luck.
But don't take our word for it; hear it yourself:
One-ish word reviews of each song:
"Rainy Taxi": Best example of Britt Daniels' voice.
"I Just Don't Understand": Wanna break up later?
"Knock Knock Knock": Restrained, then unraveled.
"Outlier": Fuckin' party.
"Let Me Be Mine": Intro to a romantic comedy starring Kevin James.
"Inside Out": Nineties angel dream.
"Do You": On the mixtape you made your crush in 2001.
"New York Kiss": Electro-gaze slow motion prom.
"Rent I Pay": Sticking it to the man.
"They Want My Soul": Music video starring a sad waitress.
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