Lincoln - They Might Be Giants

A late eighties They Might Be Giants album with a generous 18 tracks and an essential purchase for anyone with ears. Of the 18 tracks on the album , only 18 of them are truly outstanding (!) and this is mainly due to the raw but powerful talents of John Linell and John Flansburgh.

All the tracks are written, performed and sung by the Johns, except , I think, for “Lie Still Little Bottle” (a jazz influenced insidious drive ...
...hear once for the tune to lock forever away in your whistle every day memory closet) which features Dr Kenneth Nolan on drums, and “Kiss me Son of God” (A rising manic anthem to the blood of the exploited working class) which features the Ordinaires. So this means that the majority of tracks have that early TMBG purity and feature primarily guitar and accordion, but to startling effect.

The first track “Ana Ng” ... more

A late eighties They Might Be Giants album with a generous 18 tracks and an essential purchase for anyone with ears. Of the 18 tracks on the album , only 18 of them are truly outstanding (!) and this is mainly due to the raw but powerful talents of John Linell and John Flansburgh.

All the tracks are written, performed and sung by the Johns, except , I think, for “Lie Still Little Bottle” (a jazz influenced insidious drive around your lower brain stem that you only need to hear once for the tune to lock forever away in your whistle every day memory closet) which features Dr Kenneth Nolan on drums, and “Kiss me Son of God” (A rising manic anthem to the blood of the exploited working class) which features the Ordinaires. So this means that the majority of tracks have that early TMBG purity and feature primarily guitar and accordion, but to startling effect.

The first track “Ana Ng” is pure rock, an infectious melody combined with quirky lyrics about a long distance love, with such beautiful asides as “I don’t want the world, I just want your half”. Having heard this first track you will, of course, just want to skip back to the beginning and listen to the one song over and over again, but try to remember that TMBG albums are that rare quality musical gem of perfection you are not used to and give the rest of the album a try, it is ALL this good.

The lyrics have that TMBG stamp of quirk approval, I have no idea what some of the songs are about, but they still manage to move me. The emphasis is generally on love, but covers topics such as oddly coloured hairpieces, world domination and people who stand on their heads while sending smoke signals that say “we are out of furniture”. Pure unadulterated genius.

Other outstanding racks on the album aside from these are “Cowtown” (like a few on this album, originally a song from TMBGs first demo tape), “Purple Toupee”, “Cage and Aquarium”, “Where your eyes don’t go”, “Piece of dirt”, “Mr Me”, Pencil Rain” (which featured in an early Malcolm in the Middle episode), "The World’s Address”, “I’ve got a Match”, “Santas Beard”, “You’ll Miss Me”, “They’ll need a Crane” , “Shoehorn with Teeth” , “Stand on your own Head” and “Snowball in Hell”.

Hunt it down, buy it, play it , enjoy it and thank me later for bringing it to your attention.
 

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