Cage the Elephant Album Recommendations

The old five-point scale has been retired in favor of just rating stuff 1-10, which allows me a much more nuanced final rating. Still don't take it that seriously. Most of these come from my own collection, so the grades skew rather high. Your results may vary if you send me stuff to review.

Each album is given three Essential tracks, my personal favorites, regardless of how weird and inconsequential they are. The Quintessential pick is the one I think best represents the album as a whole, so you can try one song instead of a whole album of songs. Non-Essential picks range from merely disappointing to outright unlistenable.

Cage the Elephant

[#] Thank You Happy Birthday (2011)

Absolutely fucking bipolar.

Reviewed September 19, 2018

It seems Cage the Elephant has grown a little staid. Tell Me I'm Pretty was one Danger Mouse organ line away from being an Attack & Release retread, thanks to The Black Keys' chief nostalgiaminer Dan Auerbach running the boards. What started as a crazy, energetic garage-noise band has gracefully matured into a polished singles outfit tailor-made for the nearest Urban Outfitters, and one can only hope they reverse the trend before they grow old. It wasn't always like this, though. Come sit by the fire and let me tell you of back when Cage the Elephant could blister the most calloused among us, with 2011's Thank You Happy Birthday as my evidence.

Thank You Happy Birthday might strike some as a little discombobulated at first. Between the affected moaning and spy guitar of "Always Something", the radio-friendly optimism of "Shake Me Down", the absolutely fucking manic noise rock fits of "Sell Yourself", and the gentle, emergent layer breeze of "Flow", the record plays like a gouged sampler tape of various fictional 90s alt rock outfits, and Cage the Elephant perfectly embodies every one. Matt Shultz, the band's frontman, puts a head on the warped bodies of every track here, interchangably cooing and screeching and proving that technically bad voices still have a place in rock music. Sometimes, the chaos is too much even for the band to handle, as "Japanese Buffalo" proves, but mostly, Thank You Happy Birthday is all winners.

Essential:	"Always Something", "Sell Yourself", "Flow"
Quintessential:	"Shake Me Down"
Non-Essential:	"Japanese Buffalo"
Rating:

[#] Cage the Elephant (2008)

A bluesy rave-up against THE MAN.

Reviewed August 11, 2023

Who the fuck told these punks from Bowling Green they could prance around on stage, writing songs about greed, vices, and the way that politics turns people into sheep? Well, anyway, I like that guy, because this album rules. This is an album I've loved for a long, long time, since I was a young lad, and a phenomenal canary trap for if someone is overly-obsessed with every band they listen to being novel or if they want them to bring the good tunes. Is Cage the Elephant novel? Absolutely not. You've heard the skronking blues guitars, you've heard the gasping, shrieking vocals, you've heard the guitar solos nestled in after the second verse—but let me tell you, Cage the Elephant do them phenomenally well. If there's a weak part of this album, I've yet to find it.

There's something hilarious about a new band starting their record off with a gigantic "fuck you" to Da Criticz, but Cage is so self-assured on "In One Ear" and delivers the track with such a musical wallop that it barely even matters. Between Matt Schulz's larger-than-the-mix, extroverted howl, Jared Champion's deceptively-nuanced drumming, and Lincoln Parish's anguished guitar soloing, if there were confidence issues here, it sure doesn't show, not in the performances nor the songwriting. The group can muscle through a loud, fast tune like "Free Love", but it's when they introduce a bit of dynamics, like on the slightly psychedelic "Lotus" or the theme to the end of your rope, "Back Against the Wall", that Cage truly stick in your head and your heart. Bless them. I hope they make it big someday.

(I suppose it's a good thing I didn't have the edition with "Cover Me Again" at the end as a kid. Aside from subverting the self-importance of the rest of their lyrics with an aching admission of phoniness as emotional body armor, thus being a far more affecting closer than "Free Love", it hits so close to home for me that I don't know if I would've been able to handle it at the much rawer age I discovered this album at. It wasn't on the original album, so I can't rank it Essential, but it's an honorary Essential. Import a copy with "Cover Me Again". You're welcome.)