[The Soup Nazi]

I've had They Want My Soul for a coupla weeks now (deluxe edish: vinyl, CD, beach ball, prints, button, the works) and it's absolutely BITCHEN. Now, it's amazing how music writers can praise a band who deserves praise and yet get shit spectacularly wrong: first of all, Spoon is NOT "essentially a one-man band"; Jim Eno's been there from the start, they did Gimme Fiction basically just between the two of them, and I think that Daniel's quantum leap from Drake Tungsten to master of the fucked-up pop song wouldn't have been possible without Jim. Second, how is the new album a "return to form"? When did they "lose" such a thing? With Transference? Ya gotta be kidding me - that's one of their best, possibly the best. And yes, "Nobody Gets Me But You" is so phenomenal it makes me think about my hot shrink... but that's another story. Third, comparisons to the fucking Pumpkins, Jack White and The Black Keys? Classic musical myopia - back in the late '70s and early '80s a lot of acts who didn't have jack squat to do with The Clash got compared to them just because Strummer & Jones' band was "the only one that mattered" (no, they were not); same bullcrap with goddamn Radiohead in the late '90s and throughout the '00s.

Anyway, props to the one and only Janet Weiss, credited on TWMS's liner notes for "song sequence services" - the album really has a great flow to it.