Sleepytime Gorilla Museum are one of the most amazing, original and confusing bands I've ever heard. They make beutiful music that makes me want to laugh and scream at the same time. The singer is very similar to Mike Patton in his delivery, range and vocal qualities and if he is to Mike Patton, then the female singer is to Bjork. She is also great. The band itself slides from nightmarish soundscapes to happy go lucky doodles to drone metal to very rocky metal.
The albums begins in quite a dark manner. With snoring and an ambient note. Dog barks and growls jump out at you. Quite nightmarish. It builds and builds until we get a beam of light shining through and then waht could almost be a Broadway or Disney voice comes through. The voice is beautiful. This man has such a deep ressonance. If God were to sing, this is how he would sound. And then we jump into a darker confused section with a high pitched falcetto from the same man. It is dark, but not entirely so. ANd again, Broadway. This track makes me so happy because of how the transitions swing from one genre to another and seems to have mood swings. A low drone ends the song saying "I am the adversary"
Track two is a metalfied continuation of the end of track one and has the singer screaming something about "the adversary". It is a great song. It never loses energy but the sound changes quite a bit. The end is like lounge music that has been played by demons. Amazingly well done.
Pthisis is another amazing song that gives us a womans voice. Hers is also quite good and seems like it could fit well on Broadway. The metalness of this song is very well done. It also though, goes to show us how avant-garde this band is with lots of "home-made" instrument sounds and a hunting violin. The man's voice duets hers for the l;ast half of the song and it gives me more eargasms. The audio sample that connects these two tracks is very cool. A crowd is cheering, you can practically see them. It reminds me of being in an old factory with hundreds outside protesting. This song just builds and builds and has some very interesting noises and beats. Not nearly as much melody as heard before but still, amazing. Some very cool percussion work fills the song. Stomp could perform this.
Flies connect into The Freedom Club. Begins with vibes I think and a guitar. The voice comes in and the song is haunting. Reminds me of the feeling you get from hearing the Godfather theme. This song encompasses this melancholy with a building rock and more of what seems to be SGM's trademark Broadway confusion and then strange soundscapes and extreme super complex sounding metal. This song is long but well worth it because it is amazing. And the best part? Another seemless transition into the next song. night sounds and a pitch shifted violin and haunting guitar set the modd for this song. More cool percussion and overall bizarreness make a masterpiece. It builds and builds into a strange almost fusion metal section. This song uses the woman's voice which makes me happy. The violin is an imporatant part of this song is clear. This song moves in long slow waves, from melancholy to a confused frenzy.
The 17 Year Cicada is a very cool soundscape of... cicadas. Other cool instrumental sounds pop in and out giving a very ryhtmic sound and then the violin joins in turning it all into a frenzy. The song builds using percussion and is just super cool. Occasional notes from some non percussive instruments enter, but the leave soon after. It's almost like some sort of strange conversation. The Creature follows and is a perfect song (duh). Bells and guitars and bass and everything bring it together. The vocals come in and tell the strangest story. It is almost sad the story and very strange. It tells about some creature. So cool. Animals are clearly a huge part of this album and it is some sort of concept album but the concept besides animals, I cannot tell. The strangness factor of this song is amazing and just blows me away. A sound byte ends the song with a conversation between two rednecks and is funny but also sets a cool mood.
Track 9. It is so cool. A violin an a sort of clicking drive along with the vocals over top with guitars occasionally bursting out and a deep, rumbling bass pulsates, changing the song. Crickets and another sound byte conversation end the song. It's some guy talking about a song he wrote and it is depressing because the man sounds mentally retarded or just stupid. Baby Doctor is flwoed into seemlessly. The longest reack on the album is also one of the best. What am I saying, they;re all the best. It begins with some sort of spanish or latin flair to it. "Thank you" is repeated over and over until we get the track title repeated over and over. It is scary. The music adds to the schizophrenic sound. The songwriting is amazing here. I just love it. It sounds like a Broadway song in plces which is not a bad thing. The man has so much emotion in his voice. Like Patton, he sings very obscure lyrics with so much emotion and beauty that no one should ever care what he is saying. The lyrics stray to something about traffic and it is ludicrous but I would never complain because it sounds so good. This song is all over the place. If any band were ever going to be accused of mindless self indulgence, it would be Sleepytime Gorilla Museum and I love it. They do everything so well I could see them releasing classic albums in any genre of one's choosing. And again, a soundbyte conversation. It sounds like a band member trying to get a hillbilly to come to a show but the man is insane. It's sad.
Cockroach begins with scared sounding breathing and then, a harp and a super broadway part. That voice will serenade me in my dreams. He is serenading a cockroach as the lyrics seem but the ammount of passion is amazing. The irony is thick here. Maybe the cockroach is a metaphor for a person but I kind of doubt it. And then we have untitled. A soundscape of swamp sounds and faint discussion and then silence as a big long break and then jungle sounds almost. Very very cool.
Skipping any part of any of these songs will cause you to miss something exciting and important. Solution - Don't skip any of it. Buy this album today. This album will make you happy to be alive and want to kill yourself all at the same time.
