They Might Be Giants

Mink Car

Restless Records

It has been a little more than five years since They Might Be Giants released a full-length studio album. In those five years, however, the Brooklyn duo released a live album (with a few new studio tracks) and an Internet-only MP3 collection entitled Long Tall Weekend. They also participated in various side projects as well as recording the moderately irritating theme song to TV’s “Malcolm In The Middle.”

Has the wait been worth it? Yes, definitely. They Might Be Giants’ new album, Mink Car, is an excellent melting pot of the band’s always-diverse musical stylings. Partly engineered by Alan Winstanley and Clive Langer, who were also behind the boards for the group’s monumental 1990 release Flood, the album is sonically delightful in all the ways it should be.

Mink Car begins in something of a nostalgic They Might Be Giants manner. The first two tracks, “Bangs” and “Cyclops Rock,” are full of bouncy keyboards, fuzzy guitars and ultra-catchy melodies that could have easily been found on their 1994 release John Henry. From there on, the album goes all over the place, stylistically speaking.

Echoes of new wave are found in tracks like “Man, It’s So Loud In Here” and “My Man.” Mid-20th century rock and roll is deeply rooted in “Yeh Yeh,” and some varying states of electronic music can be heard on “Mr. Xcitement,” a track which features The Elegant Too as well as former Soul Coughing vocalist Mike Doughty.

But, as is usually the case with They Might Be Giants, “quirky” is the operative adjective. “I’ve Got A Fang,” “Hovering Sombrero,” “Older,” “Wicked Little Critta” and “She Thinks She’s Edith Head” are immersed in the playful aesthetic associated with the band.

Lyrically, Mink Car is a lot less goofy than the band’s previous efforts. “Cyclops Rock” is a tale of heartbreak masked in minimal silliness, where Flansburgh sings “I taught you how to Cyclops Rock/And then you go and turn around and break my cyclops heart / And waste my cyclops time / And mess up my cyclops mind.” “Another First Kiss” is a straightforward love song,” and “Hopeless Bleak Despair” is a story about one person’s, uh, hopeless bleak despair, and how it came to be resolved.

Mink Car has a very polished feel to it, musically and sonically — a direction the band has been moving in since Apollo 18 was released. While some old-school They Might Be Giants fans might be jaded by the band’s departure from its lo-fi era, this album is comprised of the songwriting skills, creativity and innovative style that They Might Be Giants has always had and, judging by its present longevity as a band, always will have.