Cage The Elephant - Thank You, Happy Birthday

Fans of the show will undoubtedly know that i have a deep love of serendipitously coincidental happenstance. It just so happens that today is my birthday, and tonight's album is Cage the Elephant's sophomore effort, Thank You, Happy Birthday. I just picked it up because the cover art is pretty awesome, i'd never really heard much of their earlier stuff, and didn't give it any actual thought (didn't even notice the title).

I've written about a bunch of bands that left England to live here, but these guys went the other direction, leaving Bowling Green, KY for the outskirts of London. Strange.

The story i guess is that they did like a Beatles or Prince style thousand song recording session, decided they didn't like any of them, dug deep into their personal side project material and struggled to mash 12 of them together like an imaginary compilation album. I don't NOT believe them, but they hint at feeling a bit embarrassed by their own eagerness to be inauthentic pop punks. The good news is that regretting not putting your real self into your early albums is the most authentic fake persona a pop star can have. Sounding like the Black Keys for your 3rd album and beyond isn't exactly an "authentic" search for your own unique voice (especially when Dan Auerbach IS the producer) either, if you ask me. I don't know, the early 2010s were pretty abysmal in general so the noisy spastic 3G punk revival sound splattered across this album is actually compellingly refreshing, to me at least. I assume that accounts for a lot of the overly positive critical praise of the time as well.

Is it game changing, culturally significant teenage philosophy? No, but it is highly energetic, and remarkably free of the more contrived emo cliches of their peers. Oh, everything's still miserable, but that's no reason to not be loud and mildly obnoxious about it. They aren't real guttersnipes, but they aren't exactly posers either. I definitely remember hearing Aberdeen, and their earlier breakthrough Ain't No Rest for the Wicked the better part of a decade ago, but i have no idea where or in what context.

If i sound wishy washy it's probably just because they didn't actually build on the potential of this album. They got much less caustically annoying; sad because that's the best part of this album. Instead of refining their jackassery, they just ended up being a generic millenial rock band. I really like Thank You, Happy Birthday, but i can't shake that feeling that this is all they've got for me. It's definitely a "talking out of your ass" album, and that's actually what makes it enjoyable. I don't want them to focus or be consistent, i want them to be spastic and unpredictable. Maybe that's just my personal taste, saying "fuck it" and letting things fall out whichever way they do is my thing after all.

Happy birthday, bottle. I accidentally bought you a surprisingly complicated album from some ex-pat teenagers, 'cause i saw it and thought "this is so up your alley."

Thanks, me!

And thank you, everyone who wished me a happy birthday today. And thank you for reading this. Thank You, and Happy Birthday.

Next

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The 4 Seasons - The Genuine Imitation Life Gazette

Image
This might be my longest  album review ever. But i swear a couple times, so it's worth the read ;) How could i possibly mention Jefferson Airplane, The 4 Seasons, and Frank Zappa in the same context? Zappa said "this is rediculous" and a few years later The 4 Seasons said "you know what, Frank is right. This IS ridiculous." To which Jefferson Airplane said, "Oh. Ok. Got it." The real question is: which one is the most transgressive? Zappa said stop fighting, you look like idiots. Jefferson Airplane said i guess if love and community is a bad thing, then sure we're criminals and we'd be happy to move out into the fields and live peaceful lives without your garbage, let us go already. The 4 Seasons said hold my champagne for a moment. In 1969, The 4 Seasons released the single most ironic, acidic, extravagant, and downright befuddling album ever created, The Genuine Imitation Life Gazette. Zappa was accused of writing "shitty doo-w...
Read more

Welcome to my blog, and my record collection.

This is a blog about my love of listening to albums. It started off as a nightly perusal of my dad's record collection (which sadly became mine) on my personal facebook page. Over the last two months it has become quite an enjoyable process of simply ranting about what i think is a real art form, the album. It needs a more permanent home. Some of my reviews are positive, some negative. They might not be what you expect from album reviews, but i hope you at least find them entertaining. For the most part i do very little research, and they tend to be train of thought reactions rather than calculated essays. If nothing else, know that i'm really listening to them and whether they are amazing or abysmal i want you to go listen to them too.  I'll start migrating the 60+ i've written so far over here in the next few days, and hopefully get to the point where i just start writing them here. I'd probably even take suggestions if you're just dying to know my tho...
Read more

J. Geils Band - Freeze Frame

Image
Speaking of New Wave, I just listened to the penultimate J. Geils Band album, Feeze Frame, and it is awesome. You know the title track and Centerfold, but i highly doubt you know the album closer, Piss On The Wall.  It's not even really reviewable, to be honest, it's Freeze Frame, couple songs, Centerfold, couple more songs, and Piss On The Wall. I guess i could rehash what Post-Punk/New Wave New Wave was all about (actual dance club Rock & Roll with quirkily expensive synth leads), but you know The Cars and The Motels and Talking Heads. Believe it or not, the Ramones were considered New Wave rather than Punk in the beginning. Now we'd call them Pop Punk, but the point is that Rock in the late 70s existed on a spectrum from Corporate Cock to Nerdly Neurotic Pocket Protector, and in 1980/81 J. Geils Band said hold my beer, I gotta take a leak, how's this for "radio-friendly, twitchy nerd Rock with huge sing-along choruses?" Freakin' awesome, dude, freak...
Read more