The Dirty Projectors - "Bitte Orca" (Domino)

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If your desire for that one record that both challenges and inspires you has not yet been satisfied this year, the new album from The Dirty Projectors may be your answer. Bitte Orca offers up a set of songs that defy your usual musical expectations and is overwhelmingly successful.

The brainchild of Dave Longstreth, The Dirty Projectors have experimented with a rotating cast of band members leading up to the release of their fifth studio effort. Immediately noticeable on Bitte Orca is Longstreth's passion for a distinct and ranging vocal performance. A trio of angelic female voices, in addition to his own, gives the album its spark. A great example comes favor of the song “Stillness Is The Move”.

Bitte Orca pushes the sonic envelope. The album is full of choppy, almost erratic rhythmic shifts that don't necessary promote the dance party vibe of fellow indie rockers like Passion Pit or Animal Collective. However a song like "Useful Chamber" is still disarming in its beauty and complexity.

The difference between musical complexity and musical defiance can often be an extremely fine line. The songs of Bitte Orca manage to resist conformity and at the same time avoid ever becoming unlistenable. The uncertainty and eventual payoff of each song leaves you with a wanting to hear what's next, and that starts with the album opener "Cannibal Resource".

Perhaps not an album for the unadventurous, Bitte Orca is an unpredictable, stimulating journey; one worth taking.

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