Oh my god. I just finished listening to Woe, and now I have to review The Lonely Island's somewhat dated second comedy album Turtleneck & Chain. This is exactly what I meant when I said putting my iPod on shuffle tends to alienate people. Not to say that black metal and comedy are two completely separate universes in terms of genre… but, they are.
Anyway, most anyone who has ever watched a YouTube video, Saturday night television, has heard a pop culture reference in the last decade (specifically, every single time you happen to set foot on a fucking boat) or doesn't live under a rock has heard of the Lonely Island and their musical comedy shtick. They gained a huge following with their contributions to SNL in the form of digital shorts, and their often times hilarious music videos and skits. After the popularity of their first album, and the number of new songs and videos popping up, it seemed inevitable that these three comedy-rappers would come up with a sophomore album. The weirdly-titled Turtleneck & Chain is that album, and now that I'm listening to it again for the first time in years, I'm remembering how hilarious it is. Mostly hilarious. Okay, kind of half-funny.
The problem with a comedy album like this is that many of the songs rely heavily on their respective music videos to be funny. Songs like The Creep were really only funny when I watched the video, it just feels weirdly out of context when I hear it on my headphones. Luckily, the comedy isn't all that topical, and so it doesn't run into the problem of aging poorly. Instead, the comedy comes from lyrics being straight-up bizarre or just really blunt (i.e. I Just Had Sex). The Lonely Island also excels when they are parodying a style in music, like the ridiculously nonsensical bragging in the title-track Turtleneck & Chain, typical of most modern rap artists. Or the ludicrous, story-driven Rocky that parodies a "Dr. Seuss" kind of rhyming style popularized in the early days of hip-hop and reminiscent of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song.
Wow. Enough of trying to explain how comedy works, its making this album less and less funny the more I try to deconstruct it. Either you are going to find the songs on this album funny or you're not, but I would be very surprised if you thought the entire album was hilarious. There are songs that became huge YouTube hits (Motherlover, Threw It On the Ground, etc.) and some very meh or cringe-worthy songs you have never heard of unless you bought the album (Trouble On Dookie Island, Attracted to Us). When songs from this album come up on shuffle in my car, my girlfriend will either sing along or tell me to shut it off. What I'm trying to say is that it kinda sucked to listen to this from start to finish for the purpose of a review three years after it was released. Next!
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