Spoiler Alert: This post is about Evil Urges.

I started this post at the end of September.

It started as an album review and somehow turned into a bit of bitching. So I decided to let it be what it is.

Lets go back in time to the morning of September 23, 2009.

I have a normal morning routine. Get in my car with a cup of either ices tea or coffee, plus in my ipod, spin the dial and find the perfect melodies to infect my brain while I travel the 20 minutes to work. As most of you know, this routine can have a different feel every day, so music must be picked carefully and accordingly. Sometimes this can range as widely as Andrew WK, the Beatles, Broken Social Scene, Murder City Devils. Yesterday, I was listening to Nick Cave’s Nocturama.

But this morning was different.

I didn’t know what I felt like. So I randomly spun the dial and it landed on a band I enjoy but don’t spend a lot of time with. I notice one album, which came out June 2008 and I never got around to listening to. Thinking back, I was having a music drought at that time. I was going through a lot of emotions with one relationship coming to an end, and a new one emerging. I can only blame this oversight to being swooned away by the Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver, and City and Colour.

This album is one of the first albums I’ve listened to in a long time where it hit me right away. Every song brought forth emotions in me that just fit. It took me up and down and around. I was fully kidnapped into the lyrics, sounds, and gentle guitar riffs. Before I knew it, I was at work and I so badly wanted to continue listening. I craved to hear it all again and again.

And what album could this be? What could move me so much within just moments of hearing this bliss?

My Morning Jacket’s Evil Urges.

So I get to work and do some quick research before starting my day. My go to, of course, is Metacritic. I excitedly typed in the album name, and there was the score right in front of me. My heart dropped.

67.

67?!?!

Seriously?

I quickly scroll through the various reviews. Spin magazine says:

Evil Urges is easily MMJ’s most accomplished and ambitious record, masterfully sifting through genres.

Ok, I agree with that.

But Pitchfork says:

There are few fiery guitar freakouts, folk-influenced melodies, soaring space-rock bridges, or psychedelic flourishes here; instead, the empty space is mostly filled with serviceable falsetto funk and glassy-eyed yacht-pop.

Even the user reviews aren’t stellar. How is this possible? Am I completely musically out of touch? I pride myself on my eclectic and profound music tastes. I can’t be wrong on this one. Maybe they’re being conceptual, as in “If you like this album, you are succumbing to evil urges.” But somehow I doubt that’s what they were going for. They know what they’re doing. They had been around 10 years by the time Evil Urges was released.

Instead this musical masterpiece allows My Morning Jacket to really enjoy the spotlight of fine production admiration of masses. And I’m not saying this as a bad thing. It worked for Modest Mouse, sort of. Well, if I may digress for a moment, I do feel Modest Mouse has grown a bit boring since Good News For People Who Love Bad News. But again, a rant for another day.

My Morning Jacket managed to be quite obvious with their inspirations throughout this album, But like a fine wine, these different flavors meld and entangle themselves to create a rich, fulfilling experience. As the album starts with it’s title track, it feels slow. Some listeners desire their albums to start with a bang. Most mainstream pop albums start this way. However, Evil Urges creeps up on you, setting an introduction to the story about to unfold with just the right sprinkling of the late Jeff Buckley. Once you get to the third track
Highly Suspicious you’re thrown into a Prince flashback. Well more of if Prince and The Talking Heads had a love child. Followed by I’m Amazed, a more folk rock tune which seems to fit My Morning Jacket more than the others with it’s throwback to 1970s rock and The Grateful Dead.

This is a masterpiece album. They managed to incorporate such a variety of different musical influences which any person with discerning ear for fine music can easily pick up on.

I truly adore this album, and still listen to it on a relatively regular basis.

I guess it ended up a music review.

Pitchfork, can I have a job now?