Here Come The ABCs, There Go The Fans Of They Might Be Giants!

The Good: Educational, I suppose
The Bad: Not intended for adults and therefore not as quirky, brilliant or edgy as most TMBG
The Basics: They Might Be Giants tries their hand at creating an educational tool with Here Come The ABCs, an album utterly disappointing to adult fans of the group.


They Might Be Giants went from being an independent, quirky alternative band to a children's group so quickly that my shock has only now worn off to review their latest albums. I found out about the format change from a person who is known for playing pranks on me. Wow, I've not been so disappointed to not be the brunt of a prank in my life. Following sitting through the They Might Be Giants album No! I reluctantly sat down to listen to They Might Be Giants Here Come The ABCs.

Unlike No! there is no middle ground on this album, it is firmly a kid's album, introducing itself as a celebration of the Alphabet and serving only to educate young listeners, it is deadweight for adults. With twenty-six tracks clocking in at just over forty-three minutes, Here Come The ABCs is an educational disc that has marginal educational value and less entertainment value.

I remember growing up listening to Slim Goodbody and so useful and educational was his recording on the human body that when I was taking AP Biology in high school, I relistened to the album while studying for the simple reinforcement of some of the basics. There is nothing so sophisticated, clever or even memorably melodic on this outing from They Might Be Giants. Instead, most of the songs are simply educational by example.

So, for example, "Alphabet of Nations" simply lists countries in alphabetical order. And this does little but name countries in order, preceding by half an album a song that actually describes alphabetical order. So "Who Put The Alphabet In Alphabetical Order?" is either redundant for children who learned by example on "Alphabet of Nations" or provides a key far too late to help those who did not catch what was going on in the earlier track.

A number of the songs are even less useful. "Go for G!" and "Pictures of Pandas Painting" are simple songs that simply use the letters g and p, respectively over and over again. It's bad enough that the songs do not do so much but repeat the same sounds over and over again, but it's disappointing that the songs are together on the album. So, the same concept is repeated right away.

This might seem nitpicky, especially in light of the prior problem with the album, but where "Who Put The Alphabet In Alphabetical Order?" actually teaches a skill that could be applied when listening to "Alphabet of Nations," having "Go For G!" and "Pictures of Panda's Painting" next to each other does not challenge children to learn by anything other than rote.

The most useful song on the album is "C Is For Conifers" which provides a nice, basic botany lessons on fruit-bearing pine trees. More than simply repeating words with c, "C Is For Conifers" educates using other information and challenges the listener to not only remember various "c" words, but also provides a lesson that stimulates other memory formations, giving concrete information on different types of trees.

The track that most seems like a They Might Be Giants song is "Fake-Believe," which is reprised on the album as track 20 after appearing as the ninth track. The introduction of "Fake-Believe" features the nasal vocals of John Flansburgh and John Linnell and instantly reminds the listener of the creativity and quirky sense that used to rule the band before they launch into a series of words that begin with "f."

Like most They Might Be Giants's works, Here Come The ABCs utilizes a number of instruments as opposed to simply guitars and drums, though in this sense this album is one of their most limited endeavors. Using only minimal samples, this album does have bass, drums, trombone, tuba, trumpet and tuba accompaniment on various songs. None of the songs have anything remotely memorable as far as melodies. There is no "Pencil Rain" or "Particle Man" on this album.

But the songs will likely teach children about vowel combinations, the pairing of q and u, alphabetical order and that l,m,n, and o are not one letter. Outside the educational songs, Track 12 "Letter / Not A Letter" baffles the listener as a silly collection of recorded children identifying things that cannot be seen on the audio portion. Similarly, "Clap Your Hands," which was not good on No! is no better near the end of Here Come The ABCs.

All in all, this is a kid's album and not an impressive one at that. They Might Be Giants fans will be disappointed and their children will likely have to wait to raid their parent's stash rather than have parents subjected to this musically dumbed down collection.

The best song is "C Is For Conifers," the worst of the less-inspired tracks is "Letter / Not A Letter." Rating might be more appropriately a 5/10, though that's only for children. As a musical album, it deserves the 2 it’s getting.

For other works by They Might Be Giants, please check out my takes on:
Then: The Early Years
Flood
No!

2/10

For other musical albums, please visit my Music Review Index Page for an organized listing of those reviews!

© 2013, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Flood Of Eccentric Music As They Might Be Giants Broke Into The Mainstream!

The Good: Decent music, Good vocals, Wonderful weird lyrics
The Bad: SHORT, Some of the tracks are too quirky just for the sake of oddity.
The Basics: A strong, just-outside-the-mainstream pop-rock sound conceals the clever and eccentric lyrics of They Might Be Giants on Flood.


They Might Be Giants is the quirky duo of John Flansburgh and John Linnell and I've listened to their albums Flood and Then: The Early Years (reviewed here!) for quite some time now and it surprised me that I had not reviewed the former. When I recently encountered the They Might Be Giants album No! (reviewed here!) and was dismayed by how it delved into children's music, I decided it was time to explore where They Might Be Giants had been and relistening to Flood.

With 19 tracks clocking in at just over forty-three minutes, Flood is a triumph of quirky music that is art that pushes the boundaries of pop-rock. Flood was the mainstream success for They Might Be Giants as the group had tracks, notably "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" and "Particle Man" presented on the very popular (at the time) show Tiny Toons. "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" is the only song on the album not written by Flansburgh and Linnell. "Birdhouse In Your Soul" was played at numerous dance clubs. Picked up by Elektra, They Might Be Giants presents an album that is a bit more refined than some of their earlier works and the cover song flows seamlessly with their offbeat humorous ditties.

Unlike some of their earlier works, songs on Flood are somewhat longer than the clip-like tracks that characterized many of the Dial-a-song songs that made They Might Be Giants known in the alternative circles. The songs on this album resemble Talking Heads more than the early works of They Might Be Giants. As a result, some fans do not like how "refined" this album is.

I think this illustrates that the group is evolving in a rather positive direction. So, for example, on "Dead," the song is downright musical. The piano that accompanies the very serious vocals (if not lyrics) is professional, clean and serious. They let the absurdity be the lines, as they sing about how "I returned a bag of groceries / Accidentally taken off the shelf / Before the expiration date / I came back as a bag of groceries / Accidentally taken off the shelf / Before the date stamped on myself . . ." ("Dead"). It's clever; they sound like a pop-rock band, until one listens closely to what they are actually singing.

But Flood is a surprisingly smart album, despite such silly songs as "Particle Man." For an album geared toward young adults, it smartly dealt with peer pressure and racism ("Your Racist Friend"), the uncertainty of life ("Letterbox"), and the importance of being your own person ("Someone Keeps Moving My Chair"). When was the last time a mainstream pop-rock song sand out "This is where the party ends / I can't stand here listening to you / And your racist friend / I know politics bore you / But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you /You and your racist friend" ("Your Racist Friend")? Hell, when was the last time a mainstream artist used such solid diction as "hypocrite?"

They Might Be Giants is deceptively smart in its musicmaking, creating an album that resonates well beyond 1990, when it was originally released. In fact, the only track that dates the album is the opener, "Theme From Flood." "Birdhouse In Your Soul" is a cutting edge pop-dance track that would still rock in clubs today.

What keeps Flood worthy of the attention of those who loved the early works of They Might Be Giants are the vocals and the variety of instrumentals. The vocals - outside the first track - are performed by Flansburgh and Linnell and it carries the signature nasal sound that defines They Might Be Giants. The sound of the lyrics is very familiar to fans coming from the voices of the two Johns. People unfamiliar with They Might Be Giants will instantly be engrossed by the eclectic and often absurd sound of the lead vocalists.

The thing is, both Flansburgh and Linnell can - and do! - sing. They have wonderful voices that come through, like on the opening to "Hearing Aid" and they manage to get out complex lines fast with songs like "Letterbox." And, frankly, they sound good with their baritone performance voices.

The other distinctive, consistent quality that defines the music of They Might Be Giants from their early years through Flood is the variety of musical instruments the duo uses to make their songs. Unlike a traditional keyboard/drum machine/guitar group, They Might Be Giants employs those instruments plus accordions, violins, trumpets and even a whipcrack.

So, for those familiar only with mainstream pop-rock groups of albums, Flood offers the listener some genuine variety. The songs range from the very fast "Letterbox" and "Your Racist Friend" to the slow, sad "Road Movie To Berlin" and "Dead." This is a surprisingly strong and diverse musical experience and it is a great album for those looking to expand their horizons from the mainstream into something just around the bend.

The best song is "Birdhouse In Your Soul," the low point it "Hot Cha."

For other quirky musical acts, please visit my reviews of:
Birds And Beasts And Flowers - Autumn Defense And Hem
The Uninvited - The Uninvited
Barenaked Ladies Are Men - Barenaked Ladies

7.5/10

Check out how this album stacks up against others I have reviewed by visiting my Music Review Index Page where musical works are rated from best to worst!

© 2013, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Just Say No! To They Might Be Giants' New Children's Music Direction!

The Good: Some of the music is weird, interesting and still accessible to adults
The Bad: So many of the lyrics are simplified for kids, SHORT!
The Basics: In a disappointing musical outing, They Might Be Giants sacrifices their originality and sophistication to make a mediocre children's album.


I do not claim to be an expert on the group They Might Be Giants. I enjoyed Flood for many years and in college, when I picked up Then (reviewed here!), it too became one of the albums in highest rotation in my collection. I had heard that They Might Be Giants had veered off their usual quirky, eccentric, musical experimentations and ventured into the realm of children's music. Now, I do not have children, so when I picked up No! I listened to it and was rating it based on my appreciation of music in general and of They Might Be Giants in specific.

With seventeen tracks clocking in at just under 34 minutes, No! is a musical and stylistic disappointment that suffers the more it is listened to. First off, all of the tracks are ridiculously short, which They Might Be Giants has illustrated it is not limited to. On Flood, for example, tracks are longer than on many of the songs on Then, illustrating that the group was steadily growing, making more complex and clever songs, as opposed to musical jokes or ditties that expired rapidly. On No! they seem determined to limit themselves and that comes across as a serious limitation, as if they are regressing. So, children's album or not, it seems like the group is talented enough that they ought to have been able to make songs that were engaging and longer than an average of two minutes!

Strangely, for songs that are so short, many of them are also so lyrically limited that in order to get up to 2 minutes, many of the songs simply repeat lyrics. The height of this is track eleven, "Clap Your Hands." The only lines in this song are "Clap your hands" and "Stomp your feet" and "Jump in the air" repeated over and over again with little actual music backing the song up. Instead, it's just a chant. And it's not even smart or inspired.

They Might Be Giants have a reputation for being clever, but on No! they mortgage that for an esoteric idea that does not pan out. There is a very brief song which is the story of a broom rebelling against a human and is fleshed out by simply whistling broom noises. The song is not long enough for the story it is telling, so the listener is treated to filler. That's a shame. Similarly, the surprisingly witless "Grocery Bag" is simply a list of things that are stuck in a grocery bag. Wow. That song is so short it makes the listener wonder what the point was.

And the thing is, as someone who grew up on Marlo Thomas's "Free To Be You And Me" and Slim Goodbody, I'm not sure what the educational value of the songs on No! are. The title track No! teaches a good lesson, with its admonition that "No is no / No is always no / If they say no it means a thousand times no . . ." But outside that, the directions for crossing the street on "In The Middle, In The Middle, In The Middle," and the list of what comes from different countries in "Where Do They Make Balloons?", there is nothing here that screams educational and it's hard to see how it would be terribly entertaining for young people as well.

There is a schizophrenic quality to No! which comes across as an adult listening to the album repeatedly; for a children's album, there are songs that seem awfully like standards for They Might Be Giants, i.e. not necessarily for children. In fact, "Robot Parade" is derivative of an earlier They Might Be Giants song, "Become A Robot," which essentially says the same thing (but longer and with more instrumentals). But some of the more sophisticated and weird songs seem like they could have come from earlier in the group's career when they were simply making quirky and esoteric music.

For example, "The Edison Museum" is a song about Thomas Alva Edison's closed museum, referring to it as "The Edison Museum, once a bustling factory / Today is but a darkened, cobweb-covered hive of industry, The tallest, widest and most famous haunted mansion in New Jersey . . ." It's sung in creepy tones with lots of bass and it's a wonderfully weird song. Similarly, the chain of events in "The House At The Top Of The Tree" seem too complicated for kids (at least ones that are still trying to tell time as "Four of Two" seems to connote the album is for). And the weird superhero "John Lee Supertaster" is just weird, reminding the listener of such songs as "For Science."

In short, it seems like They Might Be Giants wants the best of both worlds, to create a children's album but not to mortgage their prior, loyal fans. As a result, they fail to create an album that is satisfying for either. Children might like the sound, but they are likely to learn very little, nor be consistently entertained. Adults are likely to be turned off by some of the educational or overly-simple songs and to shelf the album after a few albums as the songs are rather repetitive. While it might be more of an average album, it is certainly a failure and one that is impossible to recommend.

The best song is the creepy "The Edison Museum" which is part of a three-song stretch of songs that sound like They Might Be Giants' earlier works and the worst track is the simple, utterly pointless "Clap Your Hands" which seems designed to energize kids, but will just annoy adults.

For other albums geared toward children, please visit my reviews of:
Folk Songs For Young People - Pete Seeger
Saturday Morning Cartoons Greatest Hits
Around The Campfire - Peter, Paul, And Mary

3.5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my Music Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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"Then: The Early Years" The Greatest Hits Of An Unheard Of Band!

The Good: Two very filled c.d.s with lots of original music!
The Bad: Often far too quirky
The Basics: Buy if you're sick of the radio sounds! This is something completely different!

They Might Be Giants is a band that has pretty much endured as an artist's dream. For almost two decades, the band has been putting out music outside the mainstream and they've survived because of two things: 1. Fans who appreciate how weird they are and 2. They're good. Anyone can be quirky and they'll fall off the face of the planet. Like Talking Heads' impressive run as a quirky band, captured perfectly on their double album Sand In The Vaseline, Then showcases a group that is working musically and lyrically well outside the mainstream.

They Might Be Giants endures because they're something different in a country where everything on the radio blurs together as one disappointing ball of crap. They Might Be Giants is the disinfectant that can remind you that music can be different and good. The songs on Then are a wide variety of They Might Be Giants songs exploring their years from before the group received mainstream notability with their album Flood. Here, the songs are (mostly) short, musically limited or utterly experimental, as the group tries to figure itself out.

Then showcases the band's early works, the most impressive of the band's original work. Over time, it's natural that the band will mellow a bit, but here we receive a rather pure experience. Spread over two very full discs, Then includes the entire albums They Might Be Giants, Lincoln, They'll Need A Crane, and Miscellaneous T along with songs from early EPs and 19 bonus tracks! With a total of 72 songs on the two discs, this is certainly one of the most ambitious anthology projects I've ever listened to. Moreover, the booklet that describes the endeavor is quite thorough with stories about the songs, lyrics and notes on the music and the career that Then spans.

The strength of the songs on Then are the lyrics. When they're funny ("Purple Toupee"), they're funny, when they're ironic ("Youth Culture Killed My Dog") they're ironic and when they're delving into human emotion ("I've Got a Match") they're relevant. So, for example, "Alienation's For The Rich" wonderfully charts the life of an artist with humor and absurd poignancy with lines like, "I got to get a job / Got to get some pay / My son's gotta' go to art school / He's leaving in three days / And the TV's in Esperanto / You know that that's a bitch / But alienation's for the rich / And I'm feeling poorer every day." These lines are accompanied by very simply instrumentals, with bandmembers John Flansbergh and John Linnell playing keyboards and guitars but engineering a lot of their sound using samples, drum machines and synthesized music. It works wonderfully for their group, though and the sound is fresh and different from the mainstream, defining perfectly an alternative to standard pop-rock.

The problematic aspects of Then is that sometimes they go too far. "Chess Piece Face" is a good example of a song that's not just different, it's too different, it makes the listener ask, "What's the point of this?" What does it mean when the group sings "What's gonna happen to Chess Piece Face / There go I but for my face / All I know could be defaced by the facts in the life of Chess Piece Face. . ." ("Chess Piece Face")? It's somewhat gibberish, somewhat absurd and while it's addressed on a wonderful recording of a call in from a person who just doesn't get it (the track is untitled, disc one, track 23.), it's not enough to justify itself. It's absurdity for its own point. While the bulk of the songs are meaningful or fun, there are a few tracks that are just too strange.

Tracks like "The World's Address" competently mediates the two. The song is a pop-rock track that sings simply about the location of the planet, setting itself apart from any other song . . . well, in history. The song is clever and intriguing and it sounds wonderful, despite the simplistic construction of the lines and song. Then is a wonderful album for the artistic underdog - it is proof that originality can survive in today's market if only one is willing to look for good music and can find it. You'll find it here.

Then is a double c.d. with plenty of bang for its buck (though I find myself listening to the second c.d. more). The best tracks are "When It Rains It Snows" and "I've Got A Match" and the weak links are the untitled "interview" track on the first c.d. and "Weep Day" on the second c.d.!

8.5/10

For more music reviews, please check out my index page!

© 2010, 2007, 2001 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.


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