St. Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley (2006)
A week of one-album wonders
This might just have been
Danger Mouse made a name for himself by releasing the Grey Album mixtape, cutting up The Beatles’ White Album with Jay Z’s Black Album (get it?!).
That landed him a string of high profile production gigs with such artists as Gorillaz, Adele, Beck, and the Black Keys.
He also worked as a full-album collaborator on several releases I really dig, such as MF DOOM, Jemini The Gifted One, and The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O.
Cee Lo started out in the Atlanta hip hop scene in the Outkast-affiliated Goodie Mob. He left to form his own career as a neo-soul act as well as tv and production work.
The two came together and recorded this pretty interesting record, which was a massive hit on the strength of the single Crazy (you might have heard of it).
Listening all the way through, I’d say there’s nothing else as engaging as that big hit. The lead track, Go Go Gadget Gospel, is a great vocal treatment over stabbing horns and choir that is a lot of fun but only 2 minutes long.
Smiley Faces has similar Crazy energy, and a little more of an organic soul sound.
The best deep-cut track, as far as i’m concerned, is a pretty dead on take on the Violent Femmes’ Gone Daddy Gone.
Maybe because of the sense of hit-and-filler this one gives off, there was a follow-up that faded into history. They also just released another one 20 years later, so I suppose we’ll see what happens to that one.
