It really gets me going when the first song on a new (and much-anticipated) album makes me swoon on both a sexual and an intellectual level. Menomena’s “Queen Black Acid,” off their most recent album, Mines, does just that. Even more impressive is the equally stimulating bundle of tracks that follows. What girl wouldn’t like to hear, “You’re five-foot-five/not a 100 pounds/I’m scared to death/of every ounce” crooned over heavy brass? Maybe it’s me, but listeners can expect to be drawn in by catchy lyrics coupled with ever-changing delivery as the three Portland, Oregon natives share vocal duties on this new album.

It’s easy to classify Menomena as experimental, given the wide variety in sound found throughout their entire discography, which includes two previous LP’s I Am the Fun Blame Monnster! (2003) and Friend and Foe (2007), in addition to two EPs, Wet and Rustling (2003) and Under an Hour (2004). Add Mines to that list as well.

The acoustic grit of “Dirty Cartoons” reminds me of everything I like about live shows: hearing a stutter in a strum or a fault in what sounds like an otherwise perfect delivery. The simple addition of some piano also gives the track an impromptu feel, as if someone happned to lazily drag their fingers across the keyboard only make a splendid discovery.

A xylophone solo delicately opens the next track, “Tithe,” which became an instant personal favorite, if not for it’s simple beauty then for it’s heartbreaking lyrics: “Spending the best years of a childhood horizontal on the floor/like a bobsled minus the teamwork and the televised support/and nothing sounds appealing.” Driven and moody, the song showcases the band’s talent to create a surprise around every corner with a diverse selection of instruments—first a riffy guitar, next with bouncy bass, then a Korg-and-piano duet.

The second half of the album is more reminiscent of Menomena’s older work, specifically “BOTE,” which is heavy on the funk and brass. It tells a tale of reaping what you sow in a relatable “my boat is sinking and I’m lost” kind of way, while the vocals beg “Oh, sea legs please don’t fail me now!”

“Oh Pretty Boy, You’re Such a Big Boy” claims the longest song title of the album, yet has the least amount to say. Four or five lines are repeated over, driving home the track’s melancholy message:

All my life I’ve run away
From those who’ve begged me to stay
All your love is not enough
To fill my half empty cup
Your love, oh my love, is just not enough

The band has been criticized for feigning maturity, but I found Mines to be enjoyable without being too serious or calculated. This is evidenced in the last two tracks, “Sleeping Beauty” and “INTIL.” Here, Menomena find the perfect balance between what is ideal and what is real, pairing cohesive chords with sporadic, out of key movements, all without losing their sound. Perhaps that’s why Mines is such a success—it isn’t trying to be perfect. Rather the band seems to have let that fall behind a higher priority to mirror reality.

“Queen Black Acid”

At the meta-level, Fargo, North Dakota three-piece Secret Cities is a tough act to categorize. Every bite of their sound—which includes intricate piano work, whistling, rattling percussion, simmering string arrangements, dramatic crescendos and distinct elements of experimental-yet-melodic psychedelia—makes for quite the mixed bag of instruments on their debut full-length, Pink Graffiti. And in lesser hands, such a complex collage might fall flat, but here it’s just recognizably and delightfully homegrown. Their accessibility as a band was granted for me by means of a “what might come next?” sort of mystique I felt emanating from Pink Graffiti.

Much of the album was written in correspondence, with band members Charlie Gokey, Marie Parker and Alex Abnos sending four-track tapes back and forth. This method has proved an interesting way to build a record and certainly establishes the album as an art piece in itself. I find it amazing that despite inherent physical separation of the band members during the writing process, the tracks avoid a distance from one another. Pink Graffiti is an album, a cohesive experience and a journey through and through. One string that can be found threaded through many of the songs is Charlie’s blatant and subtle allusions to Brain Wilson. Consider it a bonus feature, a kind of Where’s Waldo for the ears, except you’re trying to find the infamous beach boy.

At the micro level, the album delivers a worthwhile 41 minutes of a youthful expression and dreamlike images in one’s own mind; instrumentally, the band is doing a lot of work to stimulate the senses. The vocals are mostly soft and layered, as on opener “Pink City.” Then there is the whistling, strung along several tracks that acts as the reassuring narrator of whatever escapade Pink Graffiti seems to elicit. The gorgeous “Slacker,” for example, sounds like it could be a soundtrack to a melancholy-yet-peaceful rendezvous in the forest with an intriguing stranger. The song also proves that Secret Cities have female vocals and catchy piano worth expanding upon. Parker builds softly sung versus into a melodic chorus with a brief moment of exploring her deeper vocal capabilities that would be great to hear more of. The guitar and percussion shimmer together as a working unit throughout the album. “Aw Rats” is testament to this, with it’s hammering instrumental chorus.

For anyone hungry for comparisons, there are a few standout ingredients: “Pink Graffiti pt. 2,” “Vamos A La Playa,” and “Boyfriends” are well refined staples reminiscent (at least for aesthetic reasons) of Arcade Fire’s Funeral, Cursive’s The Ugly Organ and Islands’ Return to The Sea, respectively. Other than that, it does Pink Graffiti no justice to stretch for commonalities among contemporaries.

Secret Cities seem to have come along at a unique time, where the triumphant success of many indie bands has tempted many others to share with the world what often become cliché efforts, relying on whatever gimmick gave their influences their perceived success. However, Secret Cities have replay value powerful enough to perhaps garner enough attention and prove to be an object of imitation in the next few years. Pink Graffiti seems like the album that we all hope our favorite bands make next, but instead it is a new high standard for these young emerging artists.

After doing some hard time as a favorite iPod playlist, Stars’ albums from 2004 and 2007, Set Yourself on Fire and In Our Bedroom After the War, respectively, were retired and replaced by the release of the band’s latest album, The Five Ghosts. But not for too long. After a first listen, I missed the lovesick ballads and the clever mix of angsty and upbeat I had so guiltily and diligently indulged in on previous releases.

Take The Five Ghosts’ opener, “Dead Hearts,” for example, which reads like my most recent session at the psychotherapist’s office. Stars’ lyrical question-and-answer-style was more endearing on In Our Bedroom After the War, and I wish it didn’t remind me right off the bat of what I loved most about their older work. For the majority of the tracks on the new record, Stars misuse their talent, specifically, drowning out their drummer Pat McGee with a soulless beat machine and stepping away from the boy-girl ballad method they employ so well.

“Wasted Daylight” could have used a little more development musically (i.e., cut the chorus in half) and sounds more like a waste of some clever lyrics, which much of their audience swoons for. With a little help from their website’s feature of the video, I came to like “Fixed”, thanks to singer-guitarist Amy Milan’s angelic voice.

“We Don’t Want Your Body” is a standout and appropriate choice for the middle of the album—I might not have made it through otherwise. The following track, “He Dreams He’s Awake” waits nearly three minutes to kick in to a tune worth listening to. Finally, three-fourths into the track, the vocals and instruments finally manage to synch up,but much too little, too late.

Milan’s the star again on “Changes,” an inspiring track that features some rich orchestra coupled with a funky, synth-driven beat, which is different from almost anything I’ve heard from them and (cross your fingers!) could signal that they haven’t completely lost their game.

The next few songs feel like fodder… I mean, really, with lyrics like “this is the last song ever written… this is the last time there will be a last time,” it’s hard to take the album seriously, especially considering lead singer Torquil Campbell’s often overly theatric voice.

Stars need to take one step away from the separated feel of this album and a few steps back toward the nuanced duet sounds of their previous work. Discourse plays out in some of their “Making Of The Five Ghosts” video, which leads me to wonder if the lack of organization and track development here is the symptom of an overall illness. Milan and Campbell sound best when balanced together, period. The inner teenager still trapped inside of me hopes they can make a comeback worth waiting for.

The Brooklyn-based quintet—Luke Temple (vocals), Michael Bloch (guitar), Kristina Lieberson (keyboards), Peter Hale (drums) and Jennifer Turner (bass guitar)—has maintained the variety of sound present on their favorably received self-titled debut from 2009, but this time around, listeners might strain to find a cohesive musical thread, as the band’s often-ineffable sound takes on many forms. Here We Go Magic have been described as “indie-psychadelic-folk,” but after listening to Pigeons, the label makes sense. We get a little taste of each on the new album—though not necessarily in that order. Pigeons is more like a buffet than a carefully planned five-course meal.

It’s also a more refined record, but not to a fault. The music maintains the gritty live nature of hits like “Fangela,” from their self-titled full-length. The very catchy second track, “Collector,” was released as the first single off the album, and the pace pulses hard and fast as the vocals punch in and out, woven over and under each other like a round. “I’ve got a mild fascination with you,” Temple sings over and over. The song could have easily been the opener and would have lent to a more high-key entry than what is found in the aptly named “Hibernation.”

Temple varies his vocal delivery in “Surprise,” forging into a playful new territory an octave above most of what is heard on the majority of the album. The guitar and keyboard unravel, creating a jam session mid-track that’s eventually wrangled back in before the music slows into the following number, “Bottom Feeder,” where we get another chance to experience the more straight-forward folk nature of the band. Lieberson and Turner’s ethereal vocals float above twangy guitar strums and strolling baseline.

Sharing the similar driving pace of “Collector” is “Moon,” found smack dab in the sweet center of the album. Things start to get more synthy and psychedelic toward this end of the record, with tracks like “Old World United” and “Vegetable or Native.” The exception is “Land of Feeling,” which highlights yet another facet of Temple’s vocal range. It’s obvious he is fleshing out some technique when it comes to both his lyrics and delivery. Somewhere between storyteller and swooning a lover, he’s achieved an ultimate sex appeal which stands apart from the generally lighthearted tracks.

“Herbie I Love You, Now I Know” is the album’s closer, and also shortest track, clocking in at just 2:49. It features the bands telltale metered-yet-random percussion and no vocals, a nice release back into the real world where we first began our journey. Some might say that repeating three words over and over, as is done in “Vegetable or Native,” or saying nothing at all, (“Herbie I Love You…”) is a leap into strange new territory, but HWGM is still a young troupe finding their footing and testing their audiences taste thresholds. It might seem like a stretch, but adventurous listeners will appreciate their moves in all directions on this album.

Remember marveling at the kids in school who could pat their heads and rub their stomachs at the same time? Ty Segall possess a similar, if slightly more advanced, set of enviable skills. In live shows, he can simultaneously play the drums, strum the guitar and sing, for instance. This ability (among others) is testament to his creativity as a musician, and something that sets him apart from most neo-this, post-that, garage rockers who attempt a similar sound with a band of three or more.

Melted is Segall’s third full-length, and it captures the essence of what it is to improve as a singer-songwriter. Earlier work, like his self-titled debut and last year’s Lemons, established Segall as a loud, energetic musician to watch in the Bay Area. On those records he unleashed a sound that seemed to come from a single amp cranked to its peak in a small closed concrete room; it’s an intimate sort of loudness, and Melted further builds on that particular foundation. It blends Segall’s noisy demeanor with broader variations in songwriting, and the album underwent a more complementary mix in the studio to create his most balanced recording to date.

He’s also singing a lot more these days. Songs like “Caesar” and “Imaginary Person” prove there’s more to the reverb-laden yelling Ty we’ve become accustomed to with previous work. Less than a third into “Caesar” begins what is perhaps the most melodic moment on the record, where Segall sings “why must the people cry?,” a line that gets repeated through the rest of the song, which also includes an intervening piano solo and ends lightly with a flute. Granted, the reverb is still there, and the yelling is a mainstay, because both are fruitful contributions to Segall’s aesthetic. But there’s a sense about Melted that the elements just mentioned are balanced to a near perfection.

As a whole, Melted is best suited for close spaces and parks with friends. The opener, “Finger,” is the kind of song you want to stumble upon at the bar after a couple pitchers, and when it ends, you realize how badly you want the rest of the album to play. The title track takes fuzz to a new level just before sputtering into the trippy “Mike D’s Coke,” which is essentially an interlude track at the halfway mark. Another standout, “Sad Fuzz,” answers the question of what the Beatles might sound like if they were from San Francisco in the post-grunge era.

Segall doesn’t generate a single dull moment here, but rather, creates a solid album that avoids the one big pitfall many garage-rock records face—becoming a blur of reverb and distortion rather than a collection of distinct tracks. You won’t be asking, “wait, didn’t we just listen to this song?” Melted elicits urges to ride a wave, take psychedelics, dance at a show, lay in the sun, chug a beer and ultimately be as cool as it sounds.

With their latest release, jj no 3, jj proves that their sound is as unique and mysterious as the band itself. It comes as no surprise that the Swedish duo has once again incorporated Americanized pop into the music, much like the track “Ecstasy,” off of 2009’s jj no.2 . This time, rather than a Lil’ Wayne tribute, jj gives a nod to ATC’s popular ’90s hit, “Around The World,” in the new album’s intro song, “My Life.” This intriguing track, just shy of two minutes long, evokes emotion with the unexpected lyrical question, “What the hell am I doing right?”

One might be able to answer that more readily if we knew much of anything about jj themselves. Late last year, they signed to American label Secretly Canadian. Previously they had released a single and debut album through the Sweden-based indie imprint Sincerely Yours (founded by Swedish pop group The Tough Alliance). Other than that, both labels have kept names out of it and leave us to draw conclusions about jj based solely on the music itself.

Consistently soothing vocals are woven throughout the album, but are especially so in the album’s third track, “Let Go.” A cosmic intro and effervescent feel make the theme of a heroine-overdose sound attractive, with lyrics claiming, “I’ll never be alone, I’ll always have a friend.”

The songs seem to come in pairs, with “Into the Light” and “Light” picking up the pace a bit from introductory tracks. In these songs, you need to employ a keen ear to notice the conversation between the synthesizer, acoustic guitar, and a playful whistle, which interchange effortlessly. With such couplings, one wonders if there is a point attempting to be made here. Unfortunately the tracks are so different from each other, both in sound and content, that drawing any conclusions about this is as much a feat as garnering biographical information on the band itself.

“Voi Parlate, lo Gioco” translates from Italian to English to mean, “You speak, the Game.” The track, which starts off with a strong beat, is an attempted love song of sorts, with sappy lyrics that sound as if they came straight out of an angsty teenage diary. The track’s inclusion in this album is unclear; it feels as if they have underestimated their audience, as if we wouldn’t be listening closely enough.

“Golden Virginia,” is layer-rich and has great remix potential. “You Know” is the second to last track on the CD version of the album, but those who purchase the 12” vinyl will be treated to a bonus track, a sister song entitled “I Know.”

The tender finale,“No Escapin’ This,” speaks of a life sentence in the sweetest of ways, complete with angelic vocals. However, this ending is a subtle reminder of the highs in the first and strongest track that were never again reached.

Not knowing much of the band or their history, the listener must let the music speak for itself, and is left with two successful songs bookending a confusing group of underdeveloped tracks. In “No Escapin’ This,” lyrics claim, “My biggest mistake was someone else’s.” Be wary, if you can’t take the blame, you can’t take the fame, jj.

Sisterworld marks not just the fifth full-length for Liars, but also the trio’s first album to be recorded in its entirety in the US since 2004’s They Were Wrong, So We Drowned. In a recent statement, lead vocalist Angus Andrew, guitarist Aaron Hemphill, and drummer Julian Gross—who headed to Los Angeles for the album’s creation—described Sisterworld as a representation of their own space, “completely devoid of influence, somewhere remote from the false promises and discarded dreams amassed in LA.” The album, written and recorded with John Brion and collaborator Tom Biller, explores the loss of self to society and celebrates the freedom that comes with it. The accompanying artwork insert amplifies the aforementioned concepts, with functional peepholes and photos of locked doors juxtaposed against a sprawling forest. Both music and artwork act as an invitation into the expanding world of Liars.

Sisterworld opens with the band’s first released single, “Scissors.” This intro track billows with welcoming, ethereal harmonies—not unlike those found on 2006’s Drums Not Dead—before jumping to visceral rock sounds reminiscent of their 2007 self-titled album. “Here Comes all the People” is amassed with eerie whispers and a menacing discord between instruments. As the guitar moves up and down a minor scale, nonchalant lyrics talk of “counting victims one by one.” The mood shifts just a degree darker for the following track, “Drip,” and while this one boasts a faster tempo, the lyrics are contained within a similar, sleepy delivery from Andrew.

The seventh track, a standout entitled “Proud Evolution,” starts with a slow and dramatic crescendo typical of Liars, but a minute and a half in, the beat emerges and the listener is treated to a layer-wealthy jam that is both catchy and clever. “The Overachievers,” the fastest of the tracks on the album, features carefree lyrics and a punky surfer feel, and collective chanting too. Here, the album shifts from its previous somber mood and eases into a more free-flowing experience. This juxtaposition meshes with their initial concept, from alienation to celebration. It’s all fun for these guys towards the end, and the last track, “Too Much, Too Much” is no exception. Playfully looped vocals and a bassoon track melt effortlessly into a synth, which itself fades into nothing.

Carefully placed momentary silences dapple the album, allowing for a natural sense of breathing room and before you know it, your 40-minute tour of Sisterworld is over, but it’s a trip you won’t soon forget.

Shearwater’s latest full-length, The Golden Archipelago, dropped early last week and thusly proved itself an aptly titled offering. Produced by Grammy-nominated John Congleton, the 11-track album is rooted in frontman Jonathan Meiburg’s scholarly experiences on various islands, including the Galapagos. An avid birder, Meiburg travelled throughout the world collecting data and taking photographs of different species and their habitats, and these expeditions lend themselves to The Golden Archipelago, from its namesake right down to its thematic elements (for the non-outdoorsmen reading this, a shearwater is a long-winged seabird). The quintet, made up of Meiburg, Kimberly Burke, Thor Harris, Jordan Geiger, and Kevin Schneider, was also joined at times by a 10-man backing band, whose contributions add further depth to the album as a whole.

Those familiar with Shearwater’s previous work might initially scramble to find standout tracks such as “Rooks” and “Century Eyes,” both of which appear on the band’s 2008 release, Rook. However, this recent effort makes up in totality and cohesiveness what it lacks in single-worthy tracks. Here, the whole is bigger than the sum of its parts, as the songs flow effortlessly from one to the next. Essential to this is the sequencing of the tracks, which, if disturbed would leave the listener yearning for a climax that would never arrive.

In “Black Eyes”, Meiburg calls out powerfully, treating listeners to an upbeat welcome that opens an otherwise calm album. “Corridors” is a standout among the tracks, featuring heavier, hectic drumming and a sense of urgency in Meiburg’s voice. “Runners of the Sun” is a slower, well-layered orchestral tune, and the following number, “Castaways,” features a pacing that mirrors the ebb and flow of the oceans tide. The closing song, “Missing Islands,” with its minimalistic sound and simple-yet-powerful lyrics to match, is a perfect farewell.

Along with the album, the band also sold limited-edition copies of The Golden Dossier, a 52-page book comprised of photos and field notes from Meiburg’s studies that he felt related to the world of The Golden Archipelago (Physical copies are sold out, but a PDF is available via the band’s website). One particularly quirky image is a man proudly holding a violin made of matchsticks. On the band’s blog, Meiburg comments on the portrait, saying, “to me, the image illustrates both the fragility and the resilience of human cultures, and the way that, even given the most minimal resources, we always strive — sometimes wonderfully, sometimes horribly — to make with our hands the worlds that we see in our minds.” Which is exactly what he and the rest of Shearwater have elegantly achieved with The Golden Archipelago.

Main image by Nicholas Kahn

There is a certain heir of novelty attached to any covers project—be it Johnny Cash’s American series or anything record by Me First and the Gimme Gimmes. The idea is to offer up a little something for everybody, to satisfy the diehard fans and rope in some new ones. While this concept is best used for Kidz Bop compilations, when an artist as internationally adored as Peter Gabriel announces an album of symphonic reinterpretations of popular recordings, he is owed the benefit of the doubt.

Scratch My Back, Gabriel’s first studio recording since 2002’s Up, is the first in a two-part song swap collaboration dreamed up by Gabriel and Bob Ezrin (who also produced Peter’s eponymous debut), on which Gabriel tackles orchestral and piano-only overhauls of music by artists like David Bowie, Neil Young, Lou Reed, The Arcade Fire, Bon Iver, and Radiohead. The yet-to-be-recorded second installment, appropriately titled I’ll Scratch Yours, will challenge the aforementioned to return the favor by covering material from Gabriel’s own extensive catalogue.

The concept is, at the very least, unique, and is as innovative as any project Gabriel has been attached to in his 40-plus years of making music, but with innovation comes risk. Absent here are the collaborative efforts of guitarist David Rhodes and bass player Tony Levin, whose nearly 30 years with the prog-rock pioneer have made them as much a part of the Peter Gabriel sound as the man himself. Instead, Gabriel has turned to composer John Metcalfe’s stark, emotional arrangements to provide the sonic glue for the record, which are beautiful, but often times too bold for covers of three-minute pop songs.

While the grandiose nature of the project aids the more baroque of numbers—as is the case with Elbow’s “Mirrorball” and Regina Spektor’s “Apres Moi “—Gabriel’s redux of The Arcade Fire’s “My Body is a Cage” turns an already doom-laden piece of music into a full-on masochistic opus—and it’s gorgeous. Stripping the original track of its gated drums (Win Butler stole them from “Biko” anyway) and roaring pipe organ, Metcalfe utilizes the inherent complexities of an orchestral setup to add depth to the harrowing lament found on the original. The soft oboe and piano melodies give way to outbursts of strings, organs, and flutes that seem to be simultaneously working for and against one another, all while Gabriel’s authoritative voice whispers and howls in both ecstasy and grief. “My Body is a Cage” succeeds in this particular milieu because this manic-depressive motif is something Gabriel has incorporated into his work since 1994’s Us. At times, it feels as though he had a hand in writing the original version.

Other songs range from true-to-the-original nods (Randy Newman’s “I Think it’s Going to Rain Today”) to melodramatic makeovers (Paul Simon’s “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble”), but all share a Gabriel-branded authenticity that, for the most part, eases the listener through Scratch My Back’s minor blemishes.

Whereas Gabriel’s post-Genesis sound has largely been characterized by his world music-influenced production, fans of the artist outside of So megahits will note that many of the compositions on Scratch My Back actually feel right at home in his catalogue. Pete’s take on Neil Young’s “Philadelphia” and David Bowie’s “Heroes” for example, aren’t so aurally farfetched from OVO’s “Father, Son” and “The Time of the Turning.” And is “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” really so different from Up closer, “The Drop”?

Gabriel’s rendition of The Magnetic Fields’ “The Book of Love” has been floating around since 2004, first appearing in the Richard Gere romantic comedy, Shall We Dance. And, while many of Gabriel’s interpretations on this release are much darker and pensive than their source material, Gabriel’s “The Book of Love” adds a great deal of levity to the original (that line about some music being transcendental and some of it being really dumb never sounded so good). The track features sublime background vocals by Gabriel’s youngest daughter, Melanie, who has performed with her father on the road since 2003’s Growing Up tour. Aside from being the only guest vocalist on the record, Melanie is said to have introduced her father to the music of many of the newer artists covered on Scratch My Back, namely Bon Iver, whose “Flume” is given an uplifting piano and brass treatment here.

Initially, an album of orchestral covers may not sound like the logical next step for the 60-year-old art-rocker, but a look at Gabriel’s evolution as a performer clearly suggests otherwise. From costumed frontman to international pop sensation, film composer, and humanitarian, Gabriel’s creative contributions have influenced all of popular media and then some. Love it or hate it, Scratch My Back isn’t just the latest record from Peter Gabriel—it’s an open dialogue with a new generation’s musical community. Hell, if Roger Waters can pen operas based on the French Revolution, can’t Peter Gabriel have a sing-a-long?

Over the last ten years, Columbus, Ohio-based humorist, Drew—best known as the author of popular webcomics Toothpaste for Dinner, Superpoop, and, along with his wife Natalie Dee, Married to the Sea—has produced some of Google’s greatest hits (Lego Porn, Charles Has a Licking Problem, Roller Chester), published a book of his drawings, and has self-released seven industrial hip-hop and indie rock albums as both Kompressor and Dog Traders, respectively.

Under his latest guise, Crudbump, Drew now unveils his first full-length album in over five years, Na$tyjam$—a literally hilarious and technically impressive electronic rap release with golden-age roots and big-balled aspirations.

Produced for the most part on equipment that pre-dates the Atari, Drew’s throwback beats make room for rhymes focused on the loll of the status quo with palpable humility. Be it the raunchy, Raekwon-without-innuendo “Expert Chef” or the equally mirthful “Girl Take Your Socks Off”—a track that boasts a sonic blueprint as ripe as its foot fetish subject matter, not to mention one of the album’s many undeniably catchy hooks—Drew’s simple rhymes are vitalized by the bass-rich, lo-fi aural atmospheres he creates for each track.

Na$tyjam$ kicks off with “Take a Number,” a sort of School House Rock lesson in bureaucratic procedure on which Drew raps: “Don’t put your paws on my candy/Squirrel motherfucker, go stock your own pantry.“  His deadpan delivery here makes it difficult to tell whether he’s actually taking a jab at the welfare system or genuinely pissed off at a snack-scavenging squirrel, but even at their nuttiest, Drew’s rhymes always manage to flow in earnest.

Similarly, “I Don’t Do Shit” makes day-to-day existence in the life of a self-employed Midwesterner so enticing that nine-to-fivers everywhere will soon be ditching their gigs for more pajama-friendly working environments. “I don’t do shit, that’s my decision/Not doing shit is like my religion/Look to the east five times a day/and if I’m doing shit, then I put it away,” Drew raps, over house-style pianos, sampled hi-hats, and synthesized brass.

Like the captions for his Toothpaste for Dinner webcomics, Drew’s lyrics subtly hint at the absurdities of suburbia in a way that’s not cynical, but embracive of all that is pedestrian. On the Chicago-repping “Bass Machine,” Drew raps, “I’m like Oprah ‘cause everybody gets a car/I’m like Oprah ‘cause everybody gets a car/I’m like Oprah ‘cause I got a book club.” And later, on “England (Last Year),” he jestfully addresses the gripes of Ohioan tourists abroad: “I went to England last year and it was fucked up/ I had to get on a plane, fuck that/I had to go all the way across the pond and it turns out it isn’t really a pond/It took about 8 hours.”

Portraying the many facets of the American Middle class is something Drew shows an unparalleled knack for on Na$tyjam$, and he’s not about to leave anyone out of the roast. Whether its channeling the voice of the oppressor, as on “Your Life is a Hellscape,” where he raps “I am in caps lock/You are in lowercase/My life is awesome/Your life is a hellscape,” or, on “Big Balls Phone Calls,” taking on the role of a Ted Strickland dialin’ baller who raps, “And if I wanted to get shot for Bush I would have gone to Iraq and Afghanistan/That’s not the planistan/Honey I Shrunk the Country starring Rick Moranistan,” no one is above critique. But nothing describes the plight of the working man quite like “Subprime Lenders,” where Drew assumes the persona of a whiskey-gulping credit lender who gets his jollies by preying on house-hungry suburbanites: “Subprime lenders going on benders/(I’ll fuck your credit up/ Subprime lenders going on benders/(Oh, you thought you could afford that house?).”

The subject matter on Na$tyjam$ may be presented in innately hilarious ways, but that never detracts from the album’s sonic integrity. Rather, Drew’s home-brewed beats and stripped-down productions add levity to the lyrical jabs and over-the-top characters here. Sure, the album is packed with countless so-funny-‘cause-it’s-true moments, but it’s the so-true-that-it’s-funny moments that make it a worthy addition to your record collection, or, uh, MP3 library.