Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

Released July 7th, 2007 on Merge Records

There are days – many of them – where I feel like Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga might low-key be my favourite album.  It is, at the very least, an album that I can throw on at any time and be perfectly comfortable with it being on.  It’s hard to pick out a favourite moment, too, since they all seem so great.  Is it the brash horns on “The Underdog”?  Is it the line about doing an airborne and settling in for the night (like there’s any settling after one of those)?  Is it the tube reverb that makes the guitars on “Don’t Make Me A Target” such a delight?  Is it the relentless snare in “You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb”?  The slinky, blatantly sexual bass line of “Don’t You Evah”?  Being a slut for the New York Times?  Maybe it’s the way the album seems sculpted to perfection, with every string, guitar, horn, and drum beat in exactly the right place.  It exudes confidence and bleeds charisma.

If there were any true justice in the universe, Spoon would be as big a band as the Rolling Stones, but instead they’re as big as LCD Soundsystem, which counts for something.  They would go on to release three more albums, of which only the last (this year’s brilliant Hot Thoughts) comes close to equaling the meticulously grooved music presented on Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga.