Jackie-O Motherfucker - Ballad of the Revolution

Album Review by Ewen Millar | 29 Jun 2009
Album title: Ballad of the Revolution
Artist: Jackie-O Motherfucker
Label: Fire
Release date: 6 July

During their creative lifespan, some bands morph from challenging radicals intent on beating their listeners into stunned submission, into fully-fledged pop songwriters embracing the euphoric glories of The Hook(TM) (see, for instance, Dirty Projectors). Other bands, like Jackie-O Motherfucker, are content with just being bloody awkward. Ballads of the Revolution, their tenth studio album, sees them cheerfully frolicking in a blur of DIY psychedelia, spattering their sound with a dollop of jazz improvisation layered over traditional folk. Of course, it's all served up by a rotating membership that seems to periodically beam down from the astral plane for a spot of guitar noodling, before zipping off to appear in other collective side projects. Having no hooks to speak of, this album instead exists as a sort of musical Stockholm Syndrome, taking you hostage until you've not only identified with it, but placed it on a towering pedestal.

http://www.myspace.com/jomf