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Geffen Records
Crystal Method: Tweekend
- Pop
- 2007
- Buy the CD
Reviewed by David Medsker
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W
ith rave culture being as popular as it is with the kids these days, you'd think that there would be more than a few American bands playing club music. I can think of three: Moby, BT and the Crystal Method. The rest is imported from the other side of the pond -- Chemical Brothers, Daft Punk, Fatboy Slim, Propellerheads, Air, Prodigy, Orbital, Underworld, Aphex Twin, Apollo 440…the list goes on and on. The Americans are holding their own, though, and Crystal Method's new album, Tweekend, keeps Old Glory flying. Thankfully, it appears that they have stopped trying to be the US Chemical Brothers, a mission doomed for failure. Instead, they went their own way, and are much better off for it.
"PHD" starts things off with a Kraftwerkian beat and robotic vocal that sounds like updated electro-funk. If break dancing had come out now, this is what they'd be dancing to. "Murder" contains a great vocal from Stone Temple Pilot Scott Weiland, which recalls Nine Inch Nails circa Pretty Hate Machine. Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine adds his pummeling guitar to "Wild Sweet & Cool" and "Name Of The Game," but perhaps the most surprising collaboration on the album is with pop god Jon Brion, who adds Wurlitzer and Chamberlain to "Over The Line." Weird, and yet it works.
Tweekend may not be as compelling an album to simply listen to as the Chemical Brothers albums are, but it's definitely more likely to keep you on a dance floor (or the treadmill) start to finish than the Chemicals will. And it is, after all, called dance music, isn't it?
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