polaroids of androids

If this humble little website was around back in 2005, when Wolf Parade's debut Apologies to the Queen Mary was released, it would have been the first bona-fide 10/10 rating we would have ever given. While the process of numerically rating things on an arbitrary scale is at best a weak indication of someone's opinion on an object's inherent quality and at worst a completely meaningless waste of space, I still feel that the fact that I am still as comfortable with that rating 3 years down the track as I would have been then definitely indicates something about the sheer excellence of the record. Even more so when considering the fact we are notoriously inconsistent with our ratings.

But this isn't an exercise in self-moderation, it's a record review, and the point I'm trying to make is that At Mount Zoomer has a lot to live up to. And that's not even taking into consideration all of the phenomenal work that Dan Boeckner and Spencer Krug put together in the interim in Handsome Furs and Sunset Rubdown, respectively. So when I say 'a lot' to live up to, I really mean 'like a months-worth-of-semen a lot'. So what then exactly is it, after wasting almost 2 paragraphs on self-indulgent drivel and jizz jokes, that this annoying twat thinks of the album, I hear you ask? Umm, yeah, pretty good, I answer nonchalantly.

Of course I'm disappointed and underwhelmed, how could I not be with such high expectations. Yet I am absolutely certain that this is one of the better records I've heard in the last 3 years. Such is the calibre of the artists involved - the supporting cast contributing just as many intangibles as the two all-stars - that they can make a piece of music nothing short of masterful and still leave one wanting more. It's the little things that bring it down a notch: a little too much synth in the chorus of Language City; the all-together confusing first half of An Animal In Your Care. On the whole, however, this is an album any other band on the planet would sell they're souls to be able to make.

The jerky swagger of Call It A Ritual really kicks the record into gear as the second track, and the album rarely falters on it's way to the climactic and epic Kissing The Beehive at the end. In between, California Dreamer, Soldier's Grin and Fine Young Cannibals provide only some of the albums bountiful highlights. So while it doesn't reach the miraculous benchmark set by it's predecessor, At Mount Zoomer still manages to show how much other artists that are trying to do similar work leave to be desired. That, and that the album artwork is fucking bonkers.