I’m trying something new – rather than pointing out particular songs that I like, I’m going to go through my music library. Hopefully this’ll give me an excuse to post a little more regularly, instead of only when I decide that any particular track is worthy of ‘favorite’ status. Also, this’ll probably result in me reviewing stuff that I don’t actually like – maybe even things that are better off being deleted from my collection.

Myth Takes always plays first by default on my car stereo, by merit of ‘!!!’ (pronounced as making a clicking sound three times in a row, e.g. ‘chk chk chk’) being the first artist name alphabetically. The titular first track is catchy, with percussion that’s precise enough to be attention-grabbing, but there’s enough grittiness that it blends well with the rest of the instrumentation. The low whispery vocals alternating with wide guitar solo lines build anticipation, even though you could argue that the payoff never comes on this track – it’s the next one where you get a climax.

‘All My Heroes Are Weirdos’ is arguably better in the first 20 seconds then in the entire rest of the song – the guitar gets a little too crazy, I think, and it makes it tough to listen to for very long – it’s nothing like the driving intro.

‘Must Be The Moon’ settles into a nice almost disco-y groove as soon as it starts, and holds onto the kick/snare/tambourine pattern throughout the rest of the track – and it’s good stuff. The vocals are interesting too – there’s just enough there to keep things interesting, but they know when to pull back and let the instruments have their turn. The electronic stuff that elbows its way in towards the end of the track is also much appreciated.

‘A New Name’ has some interest growly bass and what might be some bells, as well as occasionally cool  percussive elements, and a neat establishing guitar line, and sort of reminds me of Damon Albarn’s vocal stylings at some points.

I almost feel like ‘Heart Of Hearts’ is sort of a bridge song, I don’t want to say ‘filler’ because that sounds negative, but it just doesn’t work for me out of the context of the album – but within that context, its inclusion was fairly insightful, since it feels like it really ‘fits’ there between the first and second half.

‘Sweet Life’ isn’t all that exciting either, and I guess it kind of continues the ‘bridge’ section.

‘Yadnus’ on the other hand, starts out with a nice ragged synth lead, and one of my favorite percussion patterns – ‘Like It Or Not’ off of Confession On A Dance Floor by Madonna, for instance, sports the same 3/4 rhythm. Something about that sort of swaggering configuration always sounds really good to me. The rest of the song sort of swings around between staccato falsetto and guitar, then back to nice sparse guitar picks, and has a pretty neat finale ending.

‘Bend Over Beethoven’ is like 8 minutes, which is crazy, and it’s pretty standard !!! stuff – it does a good job of exploring all the possibilities that the song’s time affords it. I’ll bet it’d be fun to watch this song performed live.

Not a whole lot happens (apart from some interesting horns and synths) in ‘Break In Case Of Anything’, and I almost wonder if the song’s title is a reference to this track acting as a ‘break’ after the previous one.

‘Infinifold’ is the final track – and it fits in the last slot nicely. The eerie grungy guitar echoing around behind the piano and hushed vocals sound like an ending. Finally, things start to build back up at the end, about three and a half minutes into the song… but it never peaks again, it just fades out. A good way to end things.

 

It’s tough to pick my favorite song, but I’m gonna say that all three of the first tracks (Myth Takes, All My Heroes Are Weirdos, and Must Be The Moon) plus Yadnus are probably tied for first – Must Be The Moon might be slightly ahead, though, so here it is, for your listening pleasure: