Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Decked in Ziggy Stardust eye paint and custom purple catsuits, Karen O hardly seemed like a wallflower when flailing on stage, howling over the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ chunky art rock. Yet she and the band were not the most likely candidates to jump in the middle of the dance floor and go pop. Drummer Brian Chase resembled, both visually and in his heavy rudiments, a muscular Max Weinberg, while guitarist Nick Zinner hammered out squealing gothic blasts. That is, until the trio doused itself in peroxide and went Blondie for It’s Blitz!

First single “Zero” opens the record with a dazzling crescendo. Zinner vigorously scrubs at his strings, until the tick-tocking riff foams into rainbow-slicked bubbles. O spins in a trance, staring at her outstretched hands, sighing, “Can you climb, climb, climb higher?” The song shoves past YYY’s hit “Y Control” into a Donna Summer–shaped hole, and it’s dreamy.

The next three perfectly sequenced tracks slowly unravel the band’s new disco direction. O underlines the shimmering synths and spark-shooting guitars of “Heads Will Roll” with breathy lyrics of “glitter,” “silver” and “chrome.” On the appropriately titled “Soft Shock,” tickling keyboards pulse behind a swaying, lachrymose guitar line that—in typical Zinner fashion—sounds alien, unplaceable. By the cathedral-like “Skeletons,” the layers have been peeled away to expose sparse pillars and framework. Chase dramatically pounds out a slow march, while O begs, “Love, don’t cry.”

Remember, the band’s career has been largely based upon tears—those real, fat drops running down O’s face in the chilling “Maps” video. Few rock & roll singers can cut so deep, pouring their elation and pain into simple nuggets. Here, the weepy, duct-juicing love ballad is “Hysteric,” knocking you on your heels after the funky trifle “Dragon Queen.” Chase taps palpitations as O oozes into the reverb, “You suddenly complete me.” In most other vocalists’ hands, the sentiment would sound trite. In Karen’s hands, we’re mush. Which might explain the artwork.

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