MGMT: Congratulations

It was the damn cover art that made me pick up MGMT's new album Congratulations today. Looks like something straight outta Sonic Two. MGMT are in an odd place, just like the Tails lookalike on the cover. They started out as an indie band, went mainstream, and have sort of retreated into weirdo-land with this album. I'll never forget the first time I heard them. I was at CD Warehouse in 2007, "Time to Pretend" was playing, and I wanted to start a conversation with the cool retro pinup gal who was hustlin' CDs. I was like "Who is this?" and she was like "It's this band called MGMT." I really hate when people insert the word "called" while saying a band's name. Seriously, she could have just said "It's MGMT." Anyway, I thought the song was pretty rad at the time. And then I heard it 100 times. And then Radio 104.5 spun it on the hour. And then "Electric Feel" and "Kids" came out as singles and, before ya knew it, fratboys were reaching between the Kings of Leon and Muse albums at Target to purchase Oracular Spectacular. I could never get into this album, mostly because they played the shit out of the best songs on the radio. Kind of like how I've never listened to a full album by Nirvana or Led Zeppelin. Thank you 93.3 WMMR and 102.9 MGK, the stations I turned my dial to during my formative years. Anyway, their new album is surprisingly good. It sounds all pastoral folky and psychadelicious. Andrew VanWhateverHisNameIs sings like Arthur Lee from this band called Love (See how f*****g annoying it is?!) and the music is very soft and breezy, making for a very nice summertime listen if I do say so myself. I think they have lots of balls for making an album like this. It's almost like they realize that fratboys are lame, so they made an album that is fratboy un-friendly. Ain't no hit on this jaun. And then folks like me can go to Main St. Music and buy the copies they sold back for $6.99. Superb! They're also really ballsy because they refused to play "Kids" at Coachella, an act that pissed off many of their fans. Do their fans realize that that song actually came out like five years ago? They could be tired of playing it. Just sayin'.

I guess I like them now.