Tagged: funk

MGMT – Electric Feel (Oracular Spectacular, 2007)

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The haunting upper synth line at the beginning of this track is what it’s all about – and it’s woven amongst the no-nonsense drums and bassline, a declarative establishing first few bars, easily sliding into the first verse:

All along the western front
People line up to receive
She got the power in her hand
To shock you like you won’t believe

It’s epic sounding, and has enough funk/disco to make you think of disco balls, fog machines, flashing floor tiles, and brooding bass players. The apex of the song at 3:15, “Do what you feel now, electric feel now!” is almost a relief, as if you’ve been waiting all that time for a storm, and the rain has finally broken – just in time for the song to fade out.

The lyrics are about a girl, obviously, one so good that she’s like electricity. It’s not ground-breaking, but the words fit perfectly:

All along the eastern shore
Put your circuits in the sea
This is what the world is for
Making electricity
You can feel it in your mind
Oh, you can do it all the time
Plug it in and change the world
You are my electric girl

The mention of the western front and the eastern short, the ocean, the amazon, all of it makes the song seem somehow bigger and more encompassing, as if everyone were dancing in a blissfull trance, turned on by the electric feel.

edit: I just realized that the distinctive open synthline and chorus are in 6/8 time, while the verses and rest of the song are 4/4. Crazy! It’s the percussion in the intro that tipped me off – the stereotypical drum pattern would be ‘kick – snare – kick – snare’ in a 4/4 measure, but instead we get ‘kick – snare – kick kick – snare snare’, which fits perfectly into 6/8. I wonder if that’s part of the appeal?

Gnarls Barkley – Blind Mary (The Odd Couple, 2008)

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In contrast to Surprise, this track is all about the vocals and lyrics, and the instruments play a strictly supporting role.  The percussion and bassline are both catchy, but somehow Cee-Lo’s voice is the most important player. This is firmly established as soon as the song starts – the vocalizing in the beginning somehow says, “listen, I have something to tell you.” I think the chords help with this – it’s a familiar and comfortable progression, making it easy to take for granted while you listen to the words.

She’s my friend she doesn’t judge me.
She has no idea I’m ugly.
So I have absolutely nothing to hide,
because I’m so much prettier inside.

The distorted effect on the vocals somehow makes it seem really earnest, as though he were singing as hard as he could because he wants to express how much he loves her.  The sentiment is simple: she can’t see, so she doesn’t see his flaws, she only knows who he is as a person, and he finds that attractive. Is it about a blind girl that he loves, or about marijuana? It could go either way, I guess, although weed seems like more of a stretch. Either way, this is an expertly constructed song.

Gnarls Barkley – Surprise (The Odd Couple, 2008)

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As with most Gnarls Barkley tracks (and the majority of Dangermouse-produced material in general), ‘Surprise’ features incredibly catchy bass and percussion that is hard not to bob your head to. The vocalizing in the beginning and sort of oldies-sounding instrumentation does a great job of grabbing your attention, sort of like an announcement that something important is about to happen. The extra little bit of triangle and woodblock in there is like a cherry on the top of a icecream sunday, and the ragged clapping gives you a subconcious cue that other people are enjoying themselves and you should be too.

Cee-Lo’s voice weaves in and out of the instruments, not too overbearing or understated – it almost sounds like he ran across a backing track that he liked and improvised the song on a whim (not entirely unheard of, apparently).  However, in this case I’m hardly paying any attention to the lyrics, which are well-written and full of good word choices, but in the face of the expert instrumentation (which includes the vocals) they’re just not important.