Irresistible Bliss (CD)

Seemingly birthed from the gritty streets of New York City, Soul Coughing's groove oriented, hyper-kinetic, poppish funk-soul-jazz has no exact equivalent in music history. Mike (then M.) Doughty recited abstract, often absurd, poetry in a staccato, half-scat style, delivered with the gentlest sort of irony, amid random samples of everything from Howlin' Wolf to the Andrews Sisters; Meanwhile, Knitting Factory regular Sebastian Steinberg's insistent standup bass pounded a devilish bottom end. The group slowly built a following through three acclaimed albums in the 1990s, even reaching radio with quirky "Super Bon Bon" and hooky "Circles" (an almost top 40 pop hit). After the band's breakup in 2000, Doughty earned a cult following for his similar, if slightly more button-down, solo work.

• Category:  Music  »  Rock & Pop  »  Alternative
• Format: CD   Learn more about the CD format using Tower WIKI.
• Release Date: July 9, 1996
• Label: Slash
• UPC: 093624617525
• WAPI (Tower ID): 106411739
• Average Customer Review: There are no customer reviews yet. Be the first to write a review!
• Tower.com Sales Rank: #52080 in Music (See Top 100 Music Bestsellers)
• #16538 in Rock & Pop (See Top 100 Rock & Pop Bestsellers)
• #1604 in Alternative (See Top 100 Alternative Bestsellers)

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Spin (6/96, pp.112-113) - 7 - Flawed Yet Worthy - "...these white boys know more about funky grooves and groovy sounds than any bebop wannabe....it's amazing how [Doughty] can build a chorus around some arithmetic, a whole (terrific) song around the word `disseminated' and the phrase `self-fulfilling prophecy'..."
Entertainment Weekly (7/19/96, p.74) - "...Their second album of dada-dipped ditties probably won't yield any dance floor smashes, but the loosey-goosey funk of tracks like `Lazybones' may inspire listeners to jerk and lurch about their living rooms in new ways." - Rating: B+
Q (7/96, p.124) - 4 Stars - Excellent - "...Soul Coughing blur the boundaries between their preferred musical genres,...the resulting style (part jazzy hip hop, part art rock) is capably consolidated....this is music that successfully aims both for the feet and the head."
JazzTimes (12/96, p.111) - "...IRRESISTIBLE BLISS's organic, upright bass-driven grooves and lyrical witticisms make you believe that the future of rock may just be nothin' but a party."
Melody Maker (6/22/96, p.48) - "...songs which should theoretically be mellow jams are turned into sinister rambles by a hyperactive approach and quietly oddball attitude....Soul Coughing are the most necessary of necessary evils: downtrodden gutter romanticists. All hail the idiot kings."
NME (Magazine) (5/25/96, p.53) - 7 (out of 10) - "...there's enough cool cat invention, liquidated guitars and squirming pop hooks...to stun a small elk at 500 paces....What happens after rock? Indefinable bliss..."

Soul Coughing: M. Doughty (vocals, guitar); Sebastian Steinberg (bull fiddle, vocals); Mark De Gli Antoni (keyboard sampler, vocals); Yuval Gabay (drums, vocals).

Additional personnel: Walter E. Sear (Theremin).

Producers: David Kahne, Soul Coughing, Steve Fisk.

Engineers: Bill Emmons, Tim Boland.

IRRESISTIBLE BLISS is an intriguing, textured album that brings Soul Coughing's jazzy edge to the forefront. This is a band able to manage usually unachievable feats. They're sophisticated yet gritty, intelligent yet funny, and, though slick, thoroughly intriguing. The album's jazz-rock hybrid, a musical patchwork evoking tones from Morphine to Mojo Nixon, is full of lyrics dripping with satire.

Soul Coughing's attention to detail carries them from the ordinary trappings of hybrid bands into a lyrically astute and musically eclectic example of modern pop's potential. "White Girl" flaunts an addictive bass line with a raining bass drum beat and is smeared with the mention of an "innocent farm girl/raised by the aliens." When the eerie tape loop and strings dash in for the refrain, you do feel like you've been visited by aliens--the kind that make IRRESISTIBLE BLISS set in.

Opening on the insistent, instantly unforgettable groove of "Super Bon Bon," Soul Coughing's 2006 offering, IRRESISTIBLE BLISS, picks up right where its predecessor, RUBY VROOM, left off, as lyrical poet M. Doughty, with near-impossible vocal dexterity, spouts his John S. Hall-meets-William Burroughs narrative absurdities over the oddest of hip-hop/jazz collages. While many of the intricate rhymes may seem dimestore philosophy on the surface, a Swift-ian grip on language holds the best moments together. The results on "The Idiot Kings" or "How Many Cans?" may not be profound, precisely, but they are attractive and enveloping--or, in other words, irresistible bliss.

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