As my pal Chris quoted in his review, when I first spun My Morning Jacket’s latest album, Evil Urges, I said that “it’s almost like MMJ thinks they can do whatever they want now.” After the first few tracks I had to start over again and ask myself, “is this really My Morning Jacket?” I was expecting an opener like “Mahgeeta” from It Still Moves or “Wordless Chorus” from Z (which by the way, is one of my favorite songs of all time). I was setting myself up for more of the same and I didn’t get it.
Evil Urges starts out poppy with the fun “Evil Urges” but didn’t excite me like I was expecting. “Touch Me I’m Going to Scream (Part 1)” is catchy but for me at the time, very uncharacteristically My Morning Jacket. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what I liked about it but Sean in Culture Bully’s comments pointed out: “…it’s just so Roxy Music. Don’t get me wrong I love the rest of the album, but as people talk about the strange-funk of ‘Highly Suspicious’ this very casual throwback to intricate late-70’s, early-80’s synthpop isn’t given the attention it deserves.” I agree. Which brings us to track three, “Highly Suspicious.” At first it almost reminded me of Enon’s “Rubber Car” due to the juxtaposition of monstrously deep vocals almost shouting “highly suspicious / highly suspicious of you” with the verses sung in an almost obnoxious high falsetto. “What the heck is this?” I kept thinking.
This is the point where I wondered if I was really listening to the new My Morning Jacket and started over.
Now that I’ve listened to the album twenty times, it has grown on me to become one of my favorite albums of the year so far. It bounces around a lot and defies a lot of classification but it works now that I’ve put aside my expectations of what I wanted out of an MMJ album. I feel rather naïve in my initial impressions because it looking back, it isn’t actually that much of a departure for My Morning Jacket as it is growth. As said in a promotional video for Evil Urges, it’s “the next stage of the evolution of the band.” It’s true.
In fact, I’m finding the tracks I was humming and hawing on before are now some of my favorites. The rest of the album has a number of comparable throwbacks to previous MMJ material but overall this album is certainly something new. I love it front to back.
I keep finding myself going back to “Librarian,” a story lead by an acoustic guitar about a crush on a “simple little bookworm buried underneath the sexiest librarian” where he dreams she’d “take off those glasses and let down [her] hair,” spying through a bookcase fantasizing about her. The song swells with strings where he asks “what is it inside our heads / that makes us do the opposite / makes us do the opposite of what’s right for us? / Because everything would be great / everything would be good / if everybody gave / like everybody could.” I can’t put it down.
My Morning Jacket’s Evil Urges comes out on June 10th. They are performing live at the Orpheum Theater in Minneapolis on October 2nd. Tickets go on sale today at 5:00. I can’t wait.
My Morning Jacket - Evil Urges (MP3)
My Morning Jacket Official Site
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