They Might Be Giants: Factory Showroom

Sydney Morning Herald, December 1996
by Emma Tom

***

Long before The Presidents of USA there was TMBG - 3 times as quirky, 5 times as weird and, sadly, probably 0.33 times as popular. The NY duo's latest CD will leave fans of the band wriggling orgasmically around their hifi systems while everbody else will probably still think lyrics such as "The spiralling shape will make you insane" are too silly for anything except dumb answering machine messages. Let's just say the band hasn't really developed much over the years, which is probably a good thing. When you're this strange, development could be a dangerous thing. From the swelling disco strings of the Big Audio Dynamite-esque SEXXY to the cheerful doo-wop of Exquisite Dead Guy, FS is almost a dog-free zone. At times the quirk seems forced, but mostly the insane twisting of chiched pop sensibilites seems far more real to me than the original styles being satirised. There are singing saw solos, a track allegedly recorded without electricity and the usual collection of good natured, adenoidal singalongs in which TMBG continue their fine tradition of putting the "q" back into original.

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