Blitz

I've listened to the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs CD approximately 11 times since I downloaded it into my iPod. Most of this has been in the car driving all over town and out to Long Island - and Car Based Listening is still one of my favorite ways to enjoy music.

Headphones never have enough bass.

While Yeah Yeah Yeahs could put out a completely acoustic flute based CD and I would still buy it, I have mixed feelings about a dance album. First off, there's always a balance/question of an artist evolving & experimenting vs. straying away from the core of what makes them good and keeping their overall sound. Some musicians can completely change their sound while maintaining awesomeness (The Beatles, Radiohead, Bjork, PJ Harvey) while others can put out album after album of good music that's all in the same vein while not sounding like the same rehashed song over and over again (Led Zeppelin, Prince, Ladytron). And of course as an artist you can have the pitfall of not really changing but seeming to somewhat stagnate and feel recycled (recent NIN and Depeche Mode albums feel this way, although they both have their exceptional highlights).

My second point: there are tons of great electronic/dance artists that create this sound - I can put in CSS or Ladytron or the Presets for electro-dance-rock - but how many truly awesome modern rock bands are there? What makes their music stand out to me is that somehow Yeah Yeah Yeahs feel fresh and cool while still being rock music. It's kind of a shame to think they would throw that aside and instead imitate the synth based music of the 80s. And I'm not saying some of the songs aren't awesome or that they fail at creating a nice retro dance feel; I'm saying, why step backwards and copy what's been done? Why not push the sound forward somehow? What makes Radiohead and albums like OK Computer so great isn't that they suddenly decided to put out a 70s sounding southern rock album - it's that they tried to create something that was completely new and undone up until that point.

All this aside, I've still got "Dull Life," "Dragon Queen" and "Runaway" on repeat.