Adult.
Issue #31
Why Bother? (Thrill Jockey)
By Kelly Shindler
Published: March 1st, 2007 | 12:00am
ADULT., the Detroit band with a big chip on its shoulder, continues its synth-punk quest on its fourth album, Why Bother? Intense and uneven, the record lacks the reluctant dance-floor oomph that showcased the band’s knack at marrying avant-garde eccentricity with accessible electronic programming. Unlike earlier works such as Anxiety Always and Gimmie Trouble, Why Bother? labors to be difficult. As the liner notes proclaim, this is “uneasy listening.”
Why Bother? brims with disgust of everything from people and packs to panic attacks. Fortunately, behind every ennui-choked track (“Inclined to Vomit,” “I Should Care”) lurks a bitter rock gem. The excellent “I Feel Worse When I’m With You” and “You Don’t Worry Enough” — full of simple chords, peripatetic effects, and piquant drum machinery — evoke a curmudgeonly, latter-day Devo. “Herd Me,” with its knockabout ding-dongs and staccato claps, alludes to ’80s gothsters Tones on Tail. The Cure-tinged “Plagued by Fear” is almost up-tempo enough to be pop. Notable throughout is Nicola Kuperus’s elastic voice in all its shrieking, yelping glory, bringing to mind the equally experimental Karin Dreijer Andersson of fellow misanthropes the Knife.
Yet, ADULT. insists on classifying its new sound as folk, a heady sentiment the duo liken to uneasiness, counterculture, and singularity. Forget Devendra or Joanna, this is twisted, down-the-rabbit-hole stuff at home in national repositories of weird like Japan or Finland. Why Bother? may be ADULT.’s most challenging output, worrisome that the band may be taking its art too seriously. But are you folk enough to like it?
Comments
Please login to be able to comment on this article.
more