Lambchop - FLOTUS

[A Car With No Doors]

So, crackly-voiced Kurt Wagner has got himself a new album out, and this time he's gone for a whole bunch of vocoders and drum machines to flesh out his sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cf9wz5esgAo

Now, I've only very recently got into Lambchop thanks to being reminded of the glorious use of The Saturday Option in Blue Jam, but from what I've heard this is quite a departure from the usual mellow country stylings. Listening to the album as a whole I can't really hear that, it feels very fitting with the albums I've checked out, up to the point of it taking a lot of time to rattle inside my head. It's growing on me, with the exception of the first track which is fuck-boring, almost like a pisstake of Lambchop with boring mumbly shit that goes on forever. Additionally, I'm not too sure about the vocal manipulation: part of the appeal of some of their work is Wagner's strangely beautiful, rich voice and to see it buried under Introspective Electronic Processing feels like a shame. Whilst I'm still trying to soak it up, I don't think it's a coincidence that Writer and The Hustle are my favourite tracks and both contain unaltered vocals.

Anyways, any Lambchop fans here want to throw their opinion into the ring?

[Noodle Lizard]

Funny someone should bring them up, I just relistened to What Another Man Spills the other day.  That's a fucking great album.  A few songs do sound a bit similar to one another, and then some kind of stick out like a sore thumb, but it's so good.  The Saturday Option, as you mentioned, but also N.O. and Life #2.  Brilliant stuff.  I haven't heard that much else by them save for the odd song (and watching Kurt's acoustic performances), is there another album I should be giving a proper seeing to?  Not this new one, I imagine, since it sounds like a bit of a departure.

[Crabwalk]

It's all about Nixon for me. An absolutely sublime album, mixing their fragile country sound with opulent, Mayfield-esque soul. Wagner sings in a lovely falsetto for most of it. Very much an album to put on in the winter, during a stormy day.

Oh, and it contains 'Up With People', one of the best songs of the past 20 years.

[A Car With No Doors]

I haven't heard that much else by them save for the odd song (and watching Kurt's acoustic performances), is there another album I should be giving a proper seeing to?  Not this new one, I imagine, since it sounds like a bit of a departure.

As Crabwalk says, Nixon is probably their most "acclaimed" album overall. I'd personally also throw Thriller/Hank into the ring, although you may find the slightly more varied palette on there to be a mixed bag. I love that about it personally, stuff like Your Fucking Sunny Day rubbing up with Crawl Away helps to break up the monotony that you can get with that kind of otherwise quiet, un-showy sound. I still need to get into their discography more myself, having only just started listening to them properly, but that one is quite excellent in my view.

[lazyhour]

There's an amazing single album hiding in amongst the C'Mon/You C'Mon double-LP.