Pitchfork

For as long as indie drummers have been riding hi-hats, Mahjongg have taken up the noble mission of keeping their home city weird. No one knows exactly what to expect from any given performance of theirs, and they've kept up the struggle of cultivating that spontaneity on record-- which has proven a much more difficult task. On their first EP, Machinegong, they were plastic pop purveyors, afro-poppers, dance-punkers, and whatever else the hell they felt like; scattered as the styles might have been, they struck an incredible balance on that first EP that they've less successfully charted on the records that have followed.

But I can't blame them for not readily turning out another "Aluminum" or "Hot Lava". It must be chafing to be lumped in with the masses of one-trick ponies when Mahjongg were one of the only bands toying with beats from around the globe, not just early-eighties England. Now with the distance of a few years' time, we can hear how far apart Mahjongg are from the trend-- queasier, druggier, far more adventurous, and less likely to edit. Opener "Pontiac" plays with polyrhythms to get heads bobbing, starting out sounding like Konono no. 1 before arriving on a thick early 80s syncopated boom-bap. "Problems" gets more interesting and more seasick in its wobbling keyboard tones, and by the time the chimes come in near the end, its downtempo bounce sounds like a cousin to LCD Soundsystem's "Someone Great", like the early-morning hangover to that track's bittersweet euphoria.

But there's plenty of moments where they're staking their own trail, far from what any similar artist might be doing. "Tell the Police the Truth" implores honesty in the face of legal confrontation, but you can't help but read sarcasm over its pounding doorknocker beats and myriad laser effects. It's part of Kontpab's strong middle section, bolstered by "Those Birds Are Bats", the track that shakes off any of the album's prior restraint as the singer belts out his most melodic turn and the drummer pounds out a 4/4 on the bass drum in heaving release.

"Wipe Out" is perhaps too stiff and amelodic, reminiscent of some of the aimless experiments that dragged down Raydoncong 2005. The following track "Teardrops" is equally stiff, but far more layered and bewildering. Both this and "Mercury" seem to toy with modern minimal r&b-- "Mercury" more explicitly, as it's led by warbling vocals that follow the nimble two-step of the keyboards while alien chimes hover above it all. But closer "Rise Rice", for lack of a better word, is bonkers-- more polyrhthyms, more scary noises, and more drums that sound like the world is ending mark the band's own blazing, singular path. It's clearly the most stunning moment on an album that's stylistically all over the place; but does this make them underachievers, or are they leaving us wanting more? With an album this layered and omnivorous, there's not much to complain about, but if they'd used all the time they've spend on writing quasi-mystical press releases on songs as sophisticated as "Rise Rice", they might have more bands being compared to them.