Send "Ghostland Observatory " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 It's said that a rising tide lifts all boats, so the opposite would have to be true as well. Ghostland Observatory had been knocking around Austin for a few years prior to Robotique Majestique, but it was their first album to come out after MGMT blew up. Granted, what ensued was a label feeding frenzy only by 2008's standards, but it was a pretty opportune time to be in a duo whose main talking points were squealing synths, hair-metal falsettos, and a wardrobe that included capes. In light of MGMT's rough 2010, you might figure that if Ghostland Observatory hadn't made good on their "next big thing" talk already, it sure wasn't gonna happen now. Of course, it doesn't hurt that kind of armchair quarterbacking that Codename: Rondo is pretty much the same terrible album they've made three times already, only with fewer industry rubberneckers to cheer it on.Ghostland Observatory are sometimes said to be "simple" or "fun" and thus necessary in the overly stuffy world of indie rock. This overlooks that most of the other acts that Ghostland immediately conjure (Daft Punk, Hot Chip, Scissor Sisters, even George Michael balladry on "Mama") have already proven more than capable of mainstream consumption without a first-gen ringtone version of itself existing. The problem isn't that Ghostland Observatory seem like unserious people, it's that the same flippant attitude infects their musicianship. Codename: Rondo sounds like two people doing the least amount of work possible before something can be considered a "song." If you're the type who enjoys watching 35 straight minutes of College Humor clips, Codename: Rondo might be up your alley. Everyone else will just hear 10 songs that fail as both pop and humor. Unlikely to be heard in any hockey arena, a tinny rendering of the "Rock'N'Roll Part 2" beat pops up on "Glitter" (get it?) and is overtaken by Aaron Behrens' parody roadhouse blues wail filtered through a malfunctioning modem. If you can't get enough Speak & Spell vocal effects, "That's Right" and "Body Shop" (which is not about cars!) are there for you. If you're awfully generous, you can view "Give Me the Beat" as a straight-faced anti-drug/materialism, pro-"the beat" PSA, but did it have to be delivered in a "jive-turkey" cadence? And if you're someone who heard "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell" and fucking hated it, then I feel like you did after experiencing this album's title track-- which didn't deserve the multiple listens it took to figure out the joke. That's just the first half. If you make it to the end, you're rewarded with a return to blog house ("Kick Clap Speaker") where the squatters haven't taken out the trash in a decade....full text |
| Popmatters |
| In “Give Me the Beat”, a winning little song halfway through Codename: Rondo, Ghostland Observatory singer Aaron Behrens struts down the boulevard of some seedy nighttown. A “pusherman” offers him ups and downs, whites and greens; a guy in a Cadillac tries to sell him some hot jewelry; a pimp extols the services of Sheila and Jeanine (“Legs for days, they go both ways!”). To each of these characters Behrens politely replies, “That ain’t for me / Just gimme the beat!” Then the swinging electrobeat in question bounces him along on his merry way. Listening to this pollyannaish story, it’s hard not to worry for the guy. He might as well have a target on his back. The two guys in Ghostland Observatory are from Austin, Texas, but they seem to wish they resided in the Dark Underbelly of the Myth of America. Onstage, programmer and instrumentalist Thomas Turner wears a cape, just like Shelia and Jeanine’s pimp. Their songs crawl with fortune tellers and cops; ne’er-do-wells Dmitri, Jim, and Codename Rondo himself work some sinister “job”. The music’s equally dark. It’s all sparse, dry beats with minimal synth lines, occasional guitar, and effects distorting the vocals. These guys aren’t shy about their scrounge-rock influences. “Glitter” swipes Gary Glitter’s most famous groove. “Body Shop” blatantly mixes the drums from Prince’s “Hot Thing” with the car-sex metaphors from 1999. When Codename Rondo’s boss sends him to the Slurpee Station for a “drank”, he orders—what else?—a “Suicide”. Frankly, Ghostland Observatory’s music is minimal it often sounds like they tried to do as little as possible to create it. About half the songs have what you’d call “hooks”, while others are simply monologues, Vocodered and otherwise, over insistent two-chord vamps. Sometimes they pull off cool sound effects: a cowbell hitting inside the echoey concrete shell of a public bathroom (“Time”), a slam up and down the synthesized fretboard (“That’s Right”). Pleasant as they are, few of Ghostland’s songs reach out and grab you. They’re lucky Turner makes such appealing beats, because usually those beats are all that keep you hanging on. The lyrics certainly aren’t up to that task. As refreshingly detailed as their illicit narratives can be, Ghostland Observatory songs rarely explore beneath their rock-noir surfaces. In “Mama”, the slow one (and the worst one), Behrens sings a loping farewell to you-know-who, telling her “the time has come to leave again.” (That “Bohemian Rhapsody” nod may be a response to all the Freddy Mercury comparisons he gets.) He moans, “This lonely road can be so dark, can be so cold,” but he never explains which road he’s singing about. Is it the boulevard he was strutting down earlier? The road of crime that leads to prison? The Walk of Life, applicable to all? Or is this farewell just an isolated page torn from his diary? The same thing happens in “Miracles”. The fortune teller screams, “The future’s like the weather, baby / There ain’t no guarantees… that’s a guarantee!” Good advice as far as it goes, but Behrens leaves us with no idea why the advice might matter (or, for that matter, why he’s delivering it with a British accent). If this were a Springsteen song, we’d see the fortune teller’s advice pan out in the narrator’s life, to rueful or devastating effect, or we’d see that the narrator’s future is all too determined, and we’d reflect on how none of us can escape fate, or providence, whatever you wanna call it. We all are fortune’s fools… That’s silly; this is a dance record. At times it’s a pretty good one, and I haven’t even mentioned the best song yet. “Kick Clap Speaker” closes the album with a shot of squelchy acid house, Speak & Spell vocals, and laser fire. It’s the richest, fullest-sounding track out of 10. Ghostland Observatory should make a whole album as gripping. First, they’ll have to realize that a beat isn’t always enough....full text |
| Austin360 |
| “Codename: Rondo” has a promising enough start. Sure, “Glitter” doesn’t find Ghostland Observatory falsetto freakout specialist Aaron Behrens anywhere near as scorching as he was on “Paparazzi Lighting” opener “Piano Man,” but Thomas Turner’s minimalist electronic beat is groovy enough. The guitar is solid, and “Glitter” is a huge step up over the misguided instrumental opener of 2008’s somewhat overly maligned “Robotique Majestique.” But with second track “That’s Right,” “Codename: Rondo” rapidly loses steam and never quite recovers. Over an anonymous beat and a generic guitar solo, “That’s Right” spotlights a heavily processed robo-voice, a stylistic choice that — when your singer is capable of hitting the electrifying highs of Behrens — seems like making a Superman movie where the hero never flies. Unfortunately, that’s a recurring problem on “Codename: Rondo.” While Ghostland Observatory still has the chops and energy that made “Paparazzi Lightning” such a charmer, a sort of blue-collar Daft Punk fronted by Freddie Mercury, the band spends much of its fourth full-length album misallocating its resources. Turner’s beats lack propulsion and Behrens never quite cuts loose, resulting in an album that feels undercooked, a distinctly unsatisfying appetizer for the main course that is the duo’s live show. “Body Shop” and closer “Kick Clap Speaker” — the latter evoking the Macintosh SimpleText voice made famous by Radiohead’s “Fitter Happier” — make much the same mistake of underutilizing Behrens, while even the tracks where he wisely takes center stage feel limp in comparison with the band’s better songs. “Miracles” isn’t quite as cornball as the Insane Clown Posse viral sensation of the same name, but it’s close, and the spoken-word title track is a goofy experiment that doesn’t pay off....full text |
Ghostland Observatory lyrics
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