Review of Clancy (2024)

Last Updated 2024-03-31

Overcompensate

The first single dropped while I was in Boston. I watched the MV in the lobby at the Museum of Fine Art. I cannot say a bad thing about the music.

Things that immediately caught my attention:

  • So the boys decided to start an entire album with German (I heard "diese kleine", "gemacht" and "wir glauben beide", but I couldn't figure out the rest until someone on Reddit transcribed it)
  • Interpolation of "Bandito" from Trench
  • First "real" line of song begins at 1:46 which, depending on your definition, may or may not make the intro even longer than in "Implicit Demand For Proof"
  • Tyler grins every time he sings the word "overcompensate"
  • His hand signs V on "twice" which is a classic trope all tøp fans recognize
  • On "by the time", he pretends to check his watch, alluding to the short published in 2022 titled "sometimes people ask what we do all day before the show starts." where he does the same

Left: Tyler sits on a couch and looks at his wrist; right: Tyler stands in a red light and looks at his wrist

  • At the end, someone pulls off "Tyler"'s mask only to find another person. Tyler himself is actually far away from Dema, and the "Tyler" we saw throughout the video is just a citizen possessed by Tyler. The citizen has long hair and looks feminine, which is coherent with a fan theory (which I believe) that "Redecorate" from Scaled And Icy is about a transgender person.
  • Josh ordered his like 6th? 7th? 314th? custom drum kit from SJC??

Only problem I have is the youtube thumbnail. Look at Josh. Why he look like Elon Musk 😭😭😭

Josh in front of a projection screen and a line of text is projected right on his lips

The album cover & meta things

The album cover was not well received. Lots of fans say they could do better. I agree. Just look at this.

Tyler and Josh, in black and white all blurry like crafty newpaper cutouts, in front of a red/yellow background

The art style is ok, and it's reminiscent of the low-res, dithered feel of their teasing website, dmaorg.info. It's fine if it's the style they're going for. After all it's the first time the boys put themselves on a record cover.

But I mean… at least give Josh more attention… like c'mon.

The album is set to drop May 17, which made me worried because if they tour right then over summer break I might miss it.

Next Semester

Haha! They're not touring until August, and the Detroit show is on September 29. I guess you could literally… (picks up acoustic guitar) wake me up when september ends 🥁🥁🥁

Anyway, a new single dropped titled "Next Semester" and incidentally that's when I'll go to their show. I received the newsletter halfway through a take-home exam, and I was unable to concentrate ever since.

The song is unexpectedly punk, a huge deflection from the hip-hop of "Overcompensate". The bass is punchy af and sounds straight from Mike Dirnt. The drumline is almost irresponsibly simple compared to "Overcompensate". It's un-Josh.

Snap, snap, snap — it's not a bad thing. Given the punk genre, this may be intentional. Allow me to go on a tangent about Radiohead.

Back when I was in love with The Bends and thought nothing could top it, I tried Kid A and, unexpectedly, it got me hooked in just three seconds. For context, The Bends is pure rock, and Kid A is pure electronic — synthesizers, drum machines, vocoders, etc. If Wikipedia is to be trusted, it's because Radiohead grew tired of rock.

You need dynamics in a song, you need dynamics in an album, and you need dynamics in your discography. To make "[genre] and [genre] only" is to become a machine. This is why I get bored of some albums by Linkin Park and Green Day. To be fair, I get bored with tracks #6-9 on Vessel sometimes, so I'm not as biased as you think.

Back to "Next Semester". Interesting things:

  • Tyler's bass is practically identical to mine; he's got a Fender P, probably charcoal gray, and I've got a Squier PJ in the same color. Great minds think alike
  • Despite probably intended to resonate with students, it did not resonate with me because I'm doing pretty ok this semester and am not contemplating suicide no thank you will check back when i need it

Now.

Tickets.

This is the most stressful part, to get tickets before they sell out, probably not into hands of real fans, but resellers who profit with an obscene margin. I hope they die.

Here's hoping my luck works out on April 2. I hope it's less than $100, but at this point it's not really about cost.