WK27 - Ratatat - LP4 (3.5)

Released - 6/8/10

Label - XL Recordings

BLURB - I’ve had a limited experience with Ratatat over the past few years, only ever allowing a few stray tracks to make their way onto my iTunes. I’ve never really known what they were about, where they were going or what they were attempting to accomplish. I purchased their recently released, “LP4” with hopes of getting to the bottom of this. The thing is, though, after a month of listening to this record I still don’t know what they’re about, where they’re going or what their trying to accomplish. The album falls into this ‘guitar-tinged electronica’ category that seems to lack both excitement and consistency. It reminds me of a more experimental take on the record that Fang Island put out this year (which I’m planning to review soon). There are some moments of creativity and fairly ingenious instrumental pairings, but this album really never finds it’s stride, leading the listener on a forty minute ride of bland and monotonous electronica.

Rating - 3.5 Out of 10

FULL STORY - ‘Bilar’ opens the record off with a bellowing organ-esque chord that segues directly into a very industrial, machine-like beat. Accenting what sounds like a growling bass line are random and trivial punches of synth, piano and computer effects that seemingly serve no purpose. Without any chords, or keys for that matter, it’s comes off extremely hackneyed. It’s as if the duo of Mike Stroud and Evan Mast just said, ‘Hey, let’s just push all of these buttons and see what it sounds like.” Structure does arrive in a refreshing array of strings and horns halfway through the song, but what was the point of this? What we now have is this introductory track with two distinctly separate musical ideas that are tied together without any regard for continuity.

Thankfully, ‘Drugs’ redeems Ratatat with a stunning composition that fuses elements of electronica with metal guitar riffs and heavy synthesizer bass lines. The track does a good job sustaining it’s groove while altering it’s pace and energy. Portions of this song can vaguely remind you of something from Daft Punk, but it’s equally balanced out with waves of screeching guitar solos that give the song a really unique taste.

‘Party With Children’ blends a cool fusion of high pitched synth leads against a calming collection of harpsichord progressions, over what is in all likelihood the best drum pattern on the album. Shortly thereafter the guitars come gently into the foreground with something of a Latin flair that gives the track a touch of breeziness. Throughout the track the harpsichords are constantly morphing from chords to arpeggios and leads, giving the song enough variety to prevent it from becoming stagnant.

Both ‘Neckbrace’ and ‘Bob Gandhi’ are decent tracks, but nothing to write home about. ‘Neckbrace’ slants more electronic and features a funky bass line that spends much of its time battling against more random effects before the song actually begins to take any real form. Eventually strings and some acoustic guitar find their way into the mix, but they are mainly used for transitions back into more electronic dabbling. ‘Bob Gandhi’ starts off with a fairly subdued pace but transforms into a collection of anthemic guitar riffs, which will certainly draw some comparisons to Fang Island. The guitar riffs certainly make the track stand out, but the song lacks diversity and can become tired very quickly. You can’t just go: slow part -> cool guitar part -> slow part -> cool guitar part -> slow part, and call it a day.

The remainder of the album consists of all the negative factors that I’ve described so far. There is far too much dabbling and button pressing to create any kind of flow or continuity to this album. ‘We Can’t Be Stopped’ and ‘Maholo’ are so painfully boring that they can be deemed as ‘must skip’ songs. I know that to some extent they are serving as transitional pieces in between other songs on the album, but as separate tracks they just feel like unnecessary filler. If Ratatat was going to include these tracks on the album I’d much rather see them attached or weaved into other songs. This would, at the very least give some of the tracks a little bit more of an adventurous and experimental feel and would provide some sense of change and variety. But instead, they’ve inserted these two minutes songs as individual tracks that halt any pace that was accrued and prevent the audience establishing any kind of listening groove.

Another pet peeve of mine on this album is the fact that 80% of the songs all sound the same. Almost every track has some kind of slow introduction that turns into some mediocre groove, which then slows down with a collection of strings and/or harpsichords - and the whole time there are injections of synthesizers and other effects and noises. It’s entirely too predictable and the listener has no way of rembering which songs are which. I know its tough to remember song names on a purely instrumental album, but Ratatat takes it to a new level. I’ve been listening to this record for about a month now and aside from ‘Drugs.’ I’ve never been able to listen to a track on my iPod and be like, ‘Oh, this is ________ song.’ They all sound the same.

With all this being said, the album is pretty bad, but it’s not a complete disaster. You’ll be able to find some creative elements and brief glimpses of excitement, but don’t expect them to be around every corner.

Tracks

1.) Bilar

2.) Drugs

3.) Neckbrace

4.) We Can't Be Stopped

5.) Bob Gandhi

6.) Mandy

7.) Mahalo

8.) Party With Children

9.) Sunblocks

10.) Bare Feast

11.) Grape Juice City

12.) Alps