Customer Reviews

OOOH! (Out of Our Heads)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Typical Mekons- brilliant, and nothing like the previous one. Standout tracks so far include "Thee Old Trip" and "Only you and your ghost", but they're all very strong. I'm not sure I hear the Celtic influences the Amazon reviewer found, in the sense of Irish/Scottish etc. The influence that comes through the strongest to me is actually white American late 19th century spiritual (shapenote, that kind of stuff). You can hear it in the harmonies and the melodies, as well as some of the lyrics. I suppose that music was Celtic influenced. (Of course the band would probably laugh at all this analysis). Anyway, buy this album (and Original Sin and New York and, oh all of them!!)

This album-a pastiche of art rock, country and gospel-is the best thing the Leeds-Chicago band has done in years. WIth its dreamy, fiddle-backed songs of zombies, coming through fire and the general toughness of modern life, it seems like a response to September 11- though interviews with the Mekons reveal it was in the can before then. Overall, their folksiest album, and amazingly fresh for a band that's been touring for 25 years.

A curse upon anyone who claims OOOH is a return to their mid-'80s form. Now there's nothing objectionable or distasteful about this record. As far as albums go it's quite nice. It seems the cutting edges both stylistically and lyrically of those great "ghost town country" records is absent. Yeah, I listened to sound samples prior to purchasing so I knew I wasn't getting HONKY TONKIN' or THE EDGE OF THE WORLD but I was hopeful that OOOH in its full context would offer a classic period ('85-'89) Mekons fan like myself a compelling reason to pursue all those other albums that I avoided since my double whammy purchases of RETREAT FROM MEMPHIS and F.U.N.'90 many years earlier

I'll listen to this CD from time to time because I do think it's OK and perhaps it'll grow on me. But I'll not rush out to get other generously consumer-rated titles like CURSE OF THE MEKONS and JOURNEY TO THE END OF THE NIGHT. I fear those albums may strike me, like this one, as being too safe, too domestic. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery it seems Joe Strummer was impressed by this CD, as I hear OOOH all over his STREET CORE record.

I've come to realize that if the Mekons wished to return to the style of their golden age, they would have by now. Frankly they're so far removed from that particular period that I don't think they could effectively revive that style even if they wanted to. Ghost town country was unique and significant 20+ years ago and may not have the same impact now.

I am so happy the Mekons are in this world! We have survived the millennium, "robber barons still roam the land," and the Mekons don't like it any more than they used to -- "They'll be building up the temple on the backs of the people -- sign of the profit" they sing in the opening number.

OUT OF OUR HEADS is roughly similar to JOURNEY TO THE END OF THE NIGHT, but the first two tracks set a more aggressive, optimistic and skewed tone for the rest. JOURNEY is a phenomenal album (see my review), but it is the Mekons' most earnest work. OOOH! reverts to a slightly more typical irreverence, sounding perhaps like JOURNEY with a shot of MEKONS ROCK'N'ROLL.

OOOH! is great throughout, so there is no point in mentioning stand-out tracks. Just another ordinary night -- everybody sing along: "I am the King, you are the Queen, we rule nothing."

and I wish I would of heard of these guys sooner!

If any band in the world has earned the right to sound this world-weary and hopeful at once it's the Mekons.
Just buy it and listen. The music says it all.
Mekons forever.

Disembodied singing heads (Out of Our Heads, after all), "like Bob Hope entertaining the troops," figure prominently in the mostly spoken word Dancing in the Head and Bob Hope and Charity. They, and the spoken intro to Stonehead, are truly grating. But the rest of OOOH is terrific, excellent songs of loss, faith, evil, love, resignation and endurance set to music that draws on all the genres the Mekons have made their own through almost three decades, a little punk, a little pop, a good deal of avant-country. Haunting, unsettling, sometimes flat vocals complete the striking mix. Favorites: Take His Name in Vain, with its tale of "old familiar vampires," Lone Pilgrim, One X One, and Stonehead with the universal reality -- "one day we'll be gone/leaving no trace/We pride ourselves that our memory/Will vanish from the memory of the world."