Eels – Hombre Lobo: 12 Songs of Desire
Want a short, short version of this review? It’s a lot like Souljacker and Shootenanny and it’s pretty good, but not essential. I still like it though.
Eels have been steadily ironing out their signature sound to the point where the last obvious kinks seemed to have been smoothed off after the release of Souljacker. That’s the last time I think I can remember them producing music which I felt really surprised me, although that doesn’t mean that they haven’t continued to release albums which I’ve loved. Shootenanny, despite in many ways feeling a little like Souljacker-lite, was packed full of songs which I still play again and again. Blinking Lights, their double album from 2005, was touching and gorgeous to the extent that whether or not they were evolving musically all that much, I really didn’t care.
This record has a slightly more contrived character, and it’s because of the concept, I think. Subtitling it 12 Songs of Desire puts me immediately in mind of the Magnetic Fields. ‘Oh, like 69 Love Songs, only fewer’ I found myself thinking, somewhat uncharitably. But, perhaps because that title made me jump to unjustified conclusions, this seems to me just a little like a series of pieces whose expression lacks the kind of spontaneous overflowing of earlier material.
As recently as Blinking Lights I got the impression that the things E was singing about weren’t just ‘topics’, they were things so urgently front and centre in his psyche at that moment that he just had to get them out somehow. This album, on the other hand, feels something like a topic, rather than an outpouring of thoughts and emotions which could no longer be contained. Consequently, the best songs seem to be the ones where the music comes to the fore and carries them, which is not always the case with Eels, who can write incredibly simple songs very well simply because the lyrics are so plain and emotional and honest.
In the case of Hombre Lobo that seems to be less the case than usual, and I find myself most liking songs like Fresh Blood and Tremendous Dynamite which are more visceral musical experiences that the songs I tend to connect with when I listen to Eels. It’s a good album though, punky and energetic, but I gets no more than solid pass marks from me at the moment.
Eels – That Look You Give That Guy
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I like this album. It’s crunchy. It sounds like walking on gravel or through clean, untouched snow.
Is that crunchy or scrunchy? I’d go with scrunchy.
I like it too, it just seems a little less natural than previous stuff, that’s all.
same thing, except girls wear yours in their hair.
Girls wear my 12 Songs of Desire in their hair.
That’s rude, that is.