Review Summary: where elephant eyelash succeeds most is not the public humiliations yoni wolf endures through his brutally honest lyrics or the existentialist concerns he raises on occasion, but the genuine sentiments that can't help but subtly slip through his facade.
why?'s first release as a full band, although still effectively the mere vessel for yoni wolf's musical confession booth, is more thematically and musically cohesive than wolf's last release under the moniker as a solo project but retains his distinctively personal lyrical content that immediately alienates itself from or ingratiates itself to the listener. although elephant eyelash is at its core a pop album, it's far from universally accessible, blending monotone rap, nasal yells and catchy hooks to polarizing results.
as always, wolf's lyrics are charismatic in their boldness, casually poetic quite often to the point of seeming convoluted, embarrassingly honest and only rarely contemptible; 'i want my mouth to always taste a blade / but i want to kiss like taffy / hump gentle on a bed of nails / and feel salt to widen eyes', wolf sings on the at once both intimate and distant 'rubber traits'; ' i wept with my face in your night shirt / trying hard as hell to say “until death separates us" / loosening the skin on your breastbone', he sings on 'gemini (birthday song)' with heartbreaking sincerity; 'there is no grace in act five / only the nerves, insect leg twitch and involuntary bowel movements', he sings on 'act five', a song from the mortality obsessed back half of the album.
where elephant eyelash succeeds most, however, is not the public humiliations wolf endures through his brutally honest lyrics or the existentialist concerns he raises on occasion, but the genuine sentiments that can't help but subtly slip through his facade. when wolf sings 'do you still pray about me in your quiet time / cast out softcore demons when i come back home / let some nashville fake record your demo tapes?' on album highlight 'fall saddles', he doesn't sound the slightest bitter or resentful but rather nostalgic and doubtful. 'your face never forgets a cry / like trace remnants of acid in your spine', he chants on 'waterfalls', but the dry delivery betrays the true nature of the lyric. wolf seems concerned with appearing to be more honest in his lyricism than he actually is, whispering 'rain is confession weather / and we become booths of prayer if we let us' at the end of the lyrically poignant 'speech bubbles'.
the moments that might go unnoticed if they weren't so emotionally resonant are what push why?'s debut as a full band into the realm of greatness. elephant eyelash isn't the achingly sincere angst-ridden manifesto wolf seems to have intended for it to be, but it is significantly more emotionally affecting than one can imagine a more successful attempt would have been.
