Well, it’s my sad duty to report this is the first edition of Album Art Porn where the music didn’t turn out to be as amazing as the album cover. But! Hudson Mohawke’s “Butter” still has a lot going for it. Let’s start with the obvious-the reason I gave this album a listen in the first place:
I can’t get enough of this kind of lurid, 80s-inspired artwork. I am drawn to those collisions of hot pink and Day-glo yellow like…well, like this blueberry scone I’m sitting here eating that I could NOT say no to at Panera Bread. It seems like it would pretty be easy to create, too. Just take a normal photo of some animals (lizards seem to be popular subject matter), desaturate the colors a bit, apply neon overlays, then add some Miami Vice-looking text and call it a day. I’m not exactly sure what any of this has to do with “Butter,” and there isn’t a song by that name on this album, so that part was a little perplexing.
But what does it sound like?
Speaking of perplexing, I have no idea how you’d even classify the stuff on this album. But I did find this little tidbit on Wikipedia; emphasis mine:
“Hudson Mohawke is a purveyor of the hip-hop/electronic offshoot that is sometimes known as aqua-crunk or wonky, although Hudson does not accept these labels.”
“Aqua crunk?” Whatever. It’s electronica–that much is clear–but it’s all very bizarre and experimental, and mostly accompanied by sketchy, inconsistent hip hop beats. It’s almost jazz-like in that there’s no rhyme or reason to a lot of the instrumentation, and often times just sounds like noise. But sometimes there are flickers of awesomeness, like the track “Joy Fantastic,” which is one of the few that has vocals. I’ll give “Star Crackout” a pass, too, since it samples chiptunes that sound like they came from the original Metroid on NES.
It’s certainly interesting music and contains a lot of unique sounds, I just don’t think I could listen to it more than once. It’s the type of thing I might consider putting on in the background while I work, but that’s a big “might.” Five stars for something I don’t want to listen to again might seem a little generous, but I’m awarding points for creativity here.
As always, if you have Spotify, you can listen to this album right here:
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ShezCrafti’s Rating:
5 out of 10 stars.
What is Album Art Porn?
A recurring feature in which I randomly pick an album I’ve never heard of to listen to and review based solely on its cover art. It could turn out to be the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard…or completely suck. Find out with me!
