22 February 2007
tell your friends...
Words by Sean Moeller // Illustration by Josh Frankel
Deerhoof was finishing Friend Opportunity last year at the same time that a school in Maine was putting together a ballet inspired by the band’s Milkman record. What’s that matter, I guess. At the same time, it’s hard not to see this newest disc as a less frightening album than Milkman was. Not that Deerhoof is in the nightmare, scaring children busines with its experimental music, but it could be the dynamic of such an innocent, lullabye voice with cryptic lyrics that if they were recited by a smelling man in dirty clothing and a food-caked beard, you’d declare a lunatic in your presence and pass him without making eye contact. They can weird you out — not like the Sun City Girls or anything like that — but in a way that probably just makes them more interesting. Milkmen and hell, every Deerhoof piece of art could have you thinking oddly scary things. Seeing children act out its record probably didn’t impact any of the creative stairways the band stepped up in making Friend Opportunity, but this album feels gentler and less abrasive. It’s also a record that is another fine page in the group furthering its boundaries.
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...well maybe you should go listen to morressey then.