I Just Want Your Half

Nice review from Rob Mitchum at Pitchfork, of the new They Might Be Giants album, Else:

...[E]arly singles "Don't Let's Start" and "Ana Ng" could almost pass for the twitchy, catchy work of crit-faves like the dB's or the Feelies, bands too high on dork factor to have fit into the more fashionable environs of post-punk's cool cousin new-wave. No, really, listen to them again.

Fortunately, as Johns Linnell and Flansburgh go somewhat gracefully into their middle ages, they seem to be recalling some of those tighter, tauter early days, when they were closer to Devo than Elmo. The creepy Marcel Dzama art of The Else would suggest so, as would the wonderfully stiff beat of "I'm Impressed", an anthem for beta-males with music as nervous as its message, not jokingly wrapped in big rock production like so much latter-day TMBG....

Perhaps TMBG are just happier making kid's music-- even when they try to grapple with adult situations on "Upside Down Frown" or "Climbing Up the Walls" it still comes out G-rated. Or maybe they just like being in a child's ideal of a rock band, with their addictions to needless guitar solos and brass parts, long overdue for an intervention. But if they could just concentrate on what it was like to be young, but not that young, for longer than the 2:39 of "I'm Impressed", they could remind people that they were once more than just licensing geniuses and rugrat headliners, they were nervy, high-strung, geek-rock kings. I don't want the world, I just want that half.

This is a band that could have had a piece of my heart forever, but they broke that piece long, long ago. Long story short: they were goofing off, got careless, and splat!