At the end of the day, all we really want from pop music is a crafted feeling. When “Young Folks”, Peter Bjorn & John’s catchy summer piece of pop perfection slowly crept along every surface of western culture distribution (radio, television, commercials, and, finally, your mom’s minivan), we can be forgiven for believing that Peter Bjorn & John [MySpace] is a pop music band. We can also be forgiven for believing in the hype of this new release, Living Thing, as a continuation that faith. This belief is fortified by the first single, another annoyingly-catchy and whistle-able “Nothing to Worry About” that absolutely highlights the experience. But these hopes are quickly dashed under the freight train of inevitable truth: Peter Bjorn & John craft noises and sounds, and while these noises and sounds can sometimes produce what we like to call “absolutely excellent pop music,” it is more of an accidental side effect of what’s really going on here.

The context of this statement makes a lot more sense when one realizes that Peter Bjorn & John’s actual last release, Seaside Rock, contained not one line of vocals. While they save us from what many refer to as “incomplete rock,” this record has so few hooks and full-fledged works that it might be confused as a demo. Many of these songs are conservatively referred to as “pop experiments,” utilizing off-center chords, timing, and instrument choices (I was wrong in guessing which instrument was being used 8 times out of ten. But, come on, the bass line in “Living Thing” sounds like a broken Digery-Do).

To be fair to Peter Bjorn and John is that this type of pop experimentation is popular with the kids these days. Animal Collective and others have made producing an album of “let’s try this” songs perfectly acceptable, and, I admit, listening to new music these days is kind of exciting. We literally have no idea what’s going to come next, and that’s genuinely fascinating. Peter Bjorn and John are part of this movement, but I still can’t help but shake the feeling that they could be giving us album after album of hypnotically-catchy summer pop, making everyone in the world happier in the process. Instead, they gave us something to worry about.

Even though “Young Folks” has been overplayed to bloody horse death, I still have not met a single person who doesn’t like it. And, to reiterate, “Nothing to Worry About” is plenty fun and worth the single download, and “Blue Period Picasso” would make a great B-side on a single. But this isn’t an album that would normally encapsulate such a great pair of pop nuggets. Then again, maybe I’m wrong about that. Perhaps living in a world where two songs on a record of interesting experiments is better than one where there’s two songs in a pool of forgettable, mediocre takes. At least weird experimental pop makes you feel something.

[mp3] Peter Bjorn and John – “Nothing to Worry About”

Last 5 posts by K Sawyer Paul

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