The Electric Six need to slow down. With the exception of 2004, E6 has released an album every year since 2003. Flashy, E6’s 2008 installment, is not exactly what the title suggests. It feels more like a collection of songs that did not quite fit in with the songs on other albums. The lyrics are pretty hilarious, as is expected from front-man and entertainer extraordinaire Dick Valentine, but the dance beats only make brief, down-played appearances and not a single song jumps out of the stereo and grabs you like on Fire, Senor Smoke, and I Shall Exterminate Everything Around Me That Restricts Me from Being the Master. With that said, I must admit that I am quite biased towards the dance tracks. I do like “Heavy Woman,” "Face Cuts" & “Your Heat Is Rising” in their own right, but the rest of the tracks are mediocre rockers. Flashy is not an accurate reflection of E6’s catalog (because I love me some E6!) and in my opinion should be labeled as a “B-Sides” album, because the variance seems like an uncharacteristic break from usually uniquely-excellent music.
September 6, 2008
The Electric Six - Flashy (2008)
The Electric Six need to slow down. With the exception of 2004, E6 has released an album every year since 2003. Flashy, E6’s 2008 installment, is not exactly what the title suggests. It feels more like a collection of songs that did not quite fit in with the songs on other albums. The lyrics are pretty hilarious, as is expected from front-man and entertainer extraordinaire Dick Valentine, but the dance beats only make brief, down-played appearances and not a single song jumps out of the stereo and grabs you like on Fire, Senor Smoke, and I Shall Exterminate Everything Around Me That Restricts Me from Being the Master. With that said, I must admit that I am quite biased towards the dance tracks. I do like “Heavy Woman,” "Face Cuts" & “Your Heat Is Rising” in their own right, but the rest of the tracks are mediocre rockers. Flashy is not an accurate reflection of E6’s catalog (because I love me some E6!) and in my opinion should be labeled as a “B-Sides” album, because the variance seems like an uncharacteristic break from usually uniquely-excellent music.
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5 Comments:
Thats dissapointing man, Electric 6 is awesome, the patrons at Fuel really like their dance mojo. Are you saying its not worth picking up?
Hmmmm... I guess I'm saying that there are a few tracks that are good rock n roll tracks, but noting like "Synthesizer," "Dance Commander," "Boy Or Girl?," "Future Is In The Future," "Dance Epidemic," "Down At McDonnelzz," etc...
There is some good stuff, but nothing fantastic. Probably not worth an album purchase.
What? This album is AMAZING! Now I'm a huge E6 fan, but I have to say this does not disappoint. I found some of there catchiest songs right here on flashy.
Anon:
Fair enough. Agree to disagree.
After your comment, I undertook an intensely focused re-listening of the album, but quite honestly, I simply cannot rate more than two or three of the tracks higher than 3 (out of 5) stars. So, in my opinion, 10 out of the 13 tracks simply don't break into that upper echelon of musical craftsmanship… meaning they fall in the “mediocre” range.
Despite your duly noted input, I still find the album substantially disappointing.
For the sake of deliberation, what tracks do you find to be the standouts?
To be perfectly honest, I have to agree. There have been some huge E6 sleeper hits for me but after a few listens this album really doesn't jump out at me the way some of the others have. I really like "We Were Witchy Witchy White Women" and "Heavy Women" but even they barely rise to the level of Senor Smoke or the album with the long name.
I'll be seeing them live in a few weeks so I'll see if any of the songs jump out at me then!
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