From my limited experiences of them in the past, I always thought that My Morning Jacket were a bit shit, and now I have the evidence to prove it. Think of anything high pitched that you don’t like and I can almost guarantee that it’s on here somewhere.
‘Evil Urges’ is essentially a disco album, or a disco-influenced album. It’s that camp kind of tight-trousered music, permed and in soft focus. And it’s pretty much an ordeal from start to finish. The will to continue is lost somewhere during third slowie in a row ‘Sex Walkin’’ (track six), which sounds like someone taking the good bits of Fleet Foxes and turning into a Gibb brothers cast off.
Before descending into paragraph upon paragraph of derogatory slurs, it should be mentioned that ‘Librarian’ is an amusing song, with a Neil Young feel to it. It’s a highlight; tender, affectionate and not merely a crass imitation of the influences Scissor Sisters have sadly built a career around.
The single ‘Touch Me I’m Going To Scream, part 2’ sounded intriguing alone, but as part of this album it’s clear that it’s drab rather than dreamy. It doesn’t help that it is preceded by part 1 of the set, which is just an overlong tedious lament with no feeling, and seemingly no urge to finish. ‘Aluminium Park’ is something Red Hot Chilli Peppers might contribute to a High School Musical soundtrack, and stands out for at least having some teeth, however false the ‘rock out’ moments seem.
Title track and curtain raiser ‘Evil Urges’ sounds like Mika covering The Flaming Lips, which I’m sure all FL fans would agree is not a prospect to be relished. The unnaturally high vocals sound forced, and this high frequency disco-bollocks has pillaged far too much in recent years for this to even sound like an amusing piss-take.
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Track 3 marks the beginning of the repeated violating of everything that Prince set out to achieve. It’s a shrieking non-starter of a song, which goes nowhere and achieves nothing. It’s not half as fun as it think it is.
‘I’m Amazed’ falls somewhere between Spiritualized and Christian rock, which makes it both boring and worthy. It’s seems to go on for a lifetime, and is unfortunately followed up by Bee Gees derivative ‘Thank You Too,’ which is epic only is as much as it makes four minutes and twenty seconds feel like a decade. The spineless Cliff Richard undertones to the album explode on ‘Two Halves.’ It’s what happens when twee tries too hard; the evil urges are clearly lacking.
Where this album isn’t irritating, it’s just boring instead. ‘Look At You’ is a lacklustre love song, cascaded down from the sickening Valentines Day compilations generated by cretins. The riffs (the detectable ones, that is) are crass and the progression throughout is limited. My Morning Jacket is a band that many have tried to switch me on to, and maybe this is just an unfortunate introduction. There’s nothing here that completely wins me over, and for the time being I’ll continue to look the other way.
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