My Morning Jacket
Evil Urges
2008

If you download one song, download: "Sec Walkin'"

I've been a My Morning Jacket fan for quite some time. Their 2003 album, It Still Moves, mesmerized me with its Allman Brothers-style rock. And 2005's Z solidified the band's permanent place in my rotation. The difference between those two albums of course brought Beck to mind, how he went from quirky folk to hip-hop back to weird party-rock to acoustic sadness back in the 90s. This was a great rock band, unafraid of twisting their sound and reinventing old ideas.

Evil Urges is pure 70s gold. It ranges from hot funk to smooth soft-rock goodness in the vein of England Dan & John Ford Coley. Personally, the smoovier songs are the best, with "Thank You Too!", "Sec Walkin'," and "Librarian" being the sweetest downloads. "I'm Amazed" is pretty goddamned good too, sounding like a track straight off that Bob Dylan album you never owned.

No review of Evil Urges would be complete without mentioning the infamous track 3: "Highly Suspicious," which sounds to me like a little bit of Prince mixed with a little bit of Cameo -- a far cry from the 70s classic-rock sound My Morning Jacket is known for. I have to say that ultimately, I love it. Pitchfork gives the album a 4.7/10 and calls "Highly Suspicious" "eye-poppingly annoying." I say: Fuck you, Pitchfork. You're a bunch of 23-year-old dickslaps who constantly play the "I-only-like-music-you've-never-heard-of" card as if we all haven't been painfully aware of that slant since way before Bread recorded "Make it with You" back in 1970. You're all virginal posers. Evil Urges is the shit.

At the top of this post, I recommended "Sec Walkin'" as the one song you should download. I still stand behind that, as it's the one song that sums up the album better than any other. But really if you want the triple threat, the best three songs on the disc, skipping right to the advanced level, I'd suggest downloading "Touch Me I'm Going to Scream Pt. 1," "Smokin' from Shootin'" and "Touch Me I'm Going to Scream Pt. 2."

If you need more convincing, check out "Touch Me I'm Going to Scream Pt. 2" on Black Cab Sessions. It's freaking hot.