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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An indispensable "Object" for TMBG's fans, April 12, 2004
In the 2 1/2 years or so since their last rock album (2001's Mink Car), most of the output by alternative-pop duo They Might Be Giants has been either of a retrospective nature (2002's Dial-A-Song anthology) or of a specifically family-friendly nature (2002's NO! album, the 2003 children's book Bed Bed Bed). Bandmates John Flansburgh and John Linnell get back to the business of rocking, however tentatively, on the new 5-track EP Indestructible Object; at the very least, it's just a stopgap until they release their next rock album. (Yes, they're currently working on one that they hope to put out this summer.) At its best, though, this 5-song sampler gives you a taste of what else John & John have been up to lately, besides the kids' stuff, and it hints at their growing maturity.Track 1, "Am I Awake?", is the theme song that the Johns wrote and recorded last year for the Learning Channel documentary series "Resident Life". The cold, ominous techno-pop instrumentation and keyboard/accordion player Linnell's deadpan, craggy twang are perfectly suited to the befuddled musings of the lyrics, which may well be written from the viewpoints of the sleep-deprived medical interns featured on the show. ("When I get through this part, will the next one be the same? Will I be wondering if I'm awake?") Two of the EP's tracks feature TMBG's Other Thing, a small brass ensemble with whom the Johns have performed a number of shows in the past year. Track 4 is a radical reworking of the song "Ant", which was originally recorded as a B-side on the Johns' 1990 EP Istanbul (Not Constantinople). The lyrics are about how a seemingly small problem can spin out of control when ignored, and this message is underscored very well by the new arrangement -- with each verse, bespectacled guitarist Flansburgh raises the pitch and volume of his voice, and the instrumentation becomes increasingly busy. (Dig the "Hail to the Chief" refs during the third verse.) Track 5, a cover of the Beach Boys' 1966 classic "Caroline, No", was performed live on the National Public Radio program "Studio 360" in July of 2003; Flansy's vocal is unabashedly raw and emotional, and he does a beautiful job of communicating the despair and regret of the lyrics. The new EP's remaining two tracks are refreshing slices of grown-up pop-rock that bode well for TMBG's next album. The jazzy, bouncy "Au Contraire", in which Linnell pokes gentle fun at the sacred cows of history (president Franklin Roosevelt, composer J.S. Bach, Mahatma Gandhi) and pop culture (David Bowie, Jodie Foster), is very funny and cute. Even more promising is the lush, pretty "Memo to Human Resources", in which Flansburgh takes on the voice of a frustrated white-collar drone who's contemplating suicide; Flansy sings a vulnerable lead, Linnell supplies sympathetic harmonies, and the soft-rock-meets-country arrangement offsets the bleak lyrics ("I'd be shouting out to you, but I was mighty hoarse... [I'd] talk you through the finer points and issues much too small to force. Then the people came to talk me down...") nicely. In the liner notes to their 1997 compilation Then: The Earlier Years, the Johns explained that from the beginning, they saw the EP form not as "a kind of musical land-fill", but as "a useful venue for material that might have a hard time fitting into an album sequence." Indestructible Object is no exception, and fans of TMBG should definitely check it out. (Non-fans and Flansy-haters, however, may not have much use for it.)
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~ They Might Be Giants
~ They Might Be Giants
~ They Might Be Giants
~ They Might Be Giants
~ They Might Be Giants
by They Might Be Giants 
