Congratulations

MGMT: a music experimentation laboratory

American formation MGMT was launched in 2002. This project takes up the format of a true band only during concerts. Officially, MGMT consists of only two regular members: Ben Goldwasser and Andrew Vanwyngarden. These guys have always shown their project as a type of experiment. Moreover, when it all started out, they did not associate it with any commercial benefits. This is one of the main reasons why the band’s first official long player was prepared only in 2007, five years after the start. Called Oracular Spectacular, it sold more than one million copies and guaranteed its creators crowded concerts not only on their native American soil, but also in far away countries. Considering MGMT’s experimental approach with the transforming and fusing of existing genres, many listeners could make an assumption that the next album by this formation would be significantly different from its predecessors. So it was. Released in the spring of 2010, Congratulations is a surprise, delight and hope.

Refusing psychedelic rock

Before releasing Congratulations, MGMT launched a charity action offering a song called Flash Delirium for free downloading. This track was to give the audience a hint where the band was then moving. Not many tried to give a name to what they had heard. In the meantime, those who blamed the band seemed countless. Flash Delirium was in no way a song to match the frames of Oracular Spectacular. However, numerous MGMT followers simply wanted a continuation of their favorites’ debut work. But in this case the musicians would have betrayed their own principles based on non-stop creative search and musical self-transformation. The psychedelic atmosphere that amazed many who liked Oracular Spectacular, has no traces on the album’s opener, It’s Working. This uncomplicated song with a prominent bass line in the vein of new wave punk might be not a very good choice to start a long player. Song For Dan Treacy is a rock-music piece that hooks your mind with electronic organs. These compositions, as well as Flash Delirium, and I Found A Whistle are likely to get into your memory faster than the others, yet they have little to remind you of the MGMT back from 2007. The only track to please those who awaited something like Oracular Spectacular could be the twelve-minute ballad Siberian Breaks.

An MGMT secret

Congratulations may easily divide the MGMT fan army in two camps. One will gather those who want to see the band deny experiments and do what once made them an internationally recognized big act. In other words, that is focusing on the sound of Oracular Spectacular. The other camp will assemble those who approve of the band’s striving to make each new album different from the others. They are happy to see MGMT in their new shape that is mirrored by Congratulations. Three years ago, the music by the American formation was marked by a singular atmosphere, emotional overdose. The MGMT second album’s tracks are closer to this reality, just simpler. More predictable structures, stronger influence of bass and drums together with rarer usage of spacious keys that make the music more epic, profound and overwhelming, signed the turn towards funk. It is highly possible that Congratulations will be the first and the last album of this kind in the band’s discography. Only time can tell.