The MGMT takes on new business!
MGMT broke onto the scene two years ago out of Brooklyn, New York, with their debut album Oracular spectacular, which nailed electro new wave psychedelia down to the ground. In their new album, Congratulations nothing has changed on that front, but at the same time everything has changed. While there isn’t a single equivalent to Time to pretend, Kids or Electric feel, Congratulations is the better album from my point of view and maybe that’s why it’s only available as an album; there will be no singles whatsoever.
The album starts spectacularly with psych-surf guitars, echo enshrouded vocals and a driving bongo beat with It’s working, which ends with some really cool 50s Grease-style backing vocals.
Reverberating electric guitar wandering gives way to electro organ & beeps in Song for Dan Treacy, which could easily fit right in the middle of The Libertines album vocally. However, there’s also a small element of Metronomy every now and again. The best thing about Song for Dan Treacy is that it changes so much it’s like a few songs in one and so will never get boring, especially with the shimmering tambourine at the end.
Someone’s missing starts off all quiet, ambient and beautiful with more echoing vocals, but it ends with a flourish of deep dark blasts and upbeat cleaned up electro rhythms.
The album gets little flashes of electro beats in the opening of Flash delirium, but it doesn’t take long for early psychedelia sounds to take sway. There’s even some 50s TV tune flute tweets, before everything finishes in madness.
I found a whistle is soft and ambient, echoing throughout; following on from the rampaging end to Flash delirium with counterpoint perfection.
While Siberian breaks is far from bad, it’s just a bit protracted in comparison to the rest of the album, however it’s a great lengthy interlude for the final scenes to come. Sprawling melancholically, it’s a twelve minute ambient setup to the class of Brian Eno. A crazy, whirling, sort-of homage to the former Roxy Music synth keyboard player, Brian Eno is one of my favourite songs on the album.
Lady Dada’s nightmare follows Eno’s instrumental style pretty well with banshee, end of the world screeches into the wind.
The last track on the album, Congratulations, brings it all together as a whole. Opening with reminiscences of John Lennon’s Mind games, it’s an acoustic guitar rhythm led closer with a lulling feel that seems to signify MGMT’s acceptance of their popularity.
MGMT, Congratulations album review: 4.4/5
