John Henry

On this album, They Might Be Giants had a secret weapon: former Pere Ubu bassist Tony Maimone, who brings an elephantine weight to “AKA Driver,” “Snail Shell,” and “A Self Called Nowhere.” But there’s still plenty of lightness and humor here, as one would expect, and the cockeyed “Meet James Ensor” and bemused “Unrelated Thing” are classics of the They Might Be Giants type.

“Don’t see these guys, they have a band now” went the reported protests of long time fans when They Might Be Giants ditched the drum machine and brought in a full backing band for their Apollo 18 tour followed by the twenty track John Henry album. Much like the folk tale itself, John Henry is a titanic clash between the Johns’ idiosyncratic songwriting and the big metal machine we call Rock and Roll. The result is some of the most accessible and thrilling songs of their career; openers “Subliminal”, “Snail Shell”, and “Sleeping In The Flowers” zoom through accordion-led bar rock, funky indie stomps, and even elements of doom metal in less than 9 minutes. Bumped up against trucker-speed anthem “AKA Driver,” the sinister big band revival of “No One Knows My Plan,” and surprisingly wistful “The End of The Tour,” there is more than enough to pick and choose from while still taking in a rare double album that never feels its length.