Muscles Guns Babes Lemonade

Yeah, the title is a joke, and so are the lyrics, but only sort of. Muscles, a one man project from Australia, makes electronic dance music that sounds pretty much in keeping with most of the scene for the most part - it's got throbbing drums and lots of synths that swell and hit in all the usual exciting ways. But over all of this is the man himself shout-sings in gloriously multi-tracked harmony with breathless enthusiasm over every song, generally coming off as drunk and giddy. His voice is far from the smoothest in the world, and the production does little to control the idiosyncrasies of his voice, especially considering the usual ultra-clean or fuzzed-up sound of most vocals in this genre.

Lyrically, the album features all two of the usual touchstones of dance music - fucking and dancing - but in an emphatically unrefined style that is not only hilarious but also almost disturbingly honest. Perhaps shockingly, this approach manages to escape sounding forced or contrived. Half of the time, Muscles sounds almost desperate about ensuring that he has a good time, in a way that is relatable and sort of touching - on Sweaty, he sings, "I still want to touch you if you let me / because we hugged a few times and it was special," the awkward tenderness of this line contrasting with its amped-up delivery and the shouted chorus of "Peace, Love, Ecstasy, Unity, Respect!" that follows (the inclusion of "respect" is also a nice touch). Throughout, Muscles sounds like a regular dude forced awkwardly into a world of dance clichés. On closer Hey Muscles I Love You he shouts, "Hey Muscles! I love you! I wanna have your babies! Come here, I'll kiss you! Don't worry about the neighbors!" while on Marshmallow he shouts about dancing to ringtones and cooking marshmallows at what sounds like an amusingly realistic, but also pretty great dance party. The delivery of all of this is at the same level - no matter how inane his subject manner, Muscles is pumped to tell you about it.

Around all of this, the music throbs insistently and utterly dance-ably - Guns Babes Lemonade would function beautifully in all of the situations he sings about, though it might also make things sort of weird, as half the time the lyrics are calling attention to just how lame those sorts of parties are. Over the course of an hour, the fact that Muscles really only has one trick does start to wear some - every song is some sort of variation on the same rough and ready electro, and the wondrous contrasts of the vocals lose some of their appeal over the course of the album.

With that said, this is pretty fantastic stuff. That 8 up there might drop to a 7 at some point as I don't think the music itself will hold up particularly well over time, but I'm willing the guy the benefit of the doubt. At a party or on headphones, it's pretty hard to resist the album's boundless enthusiasm. Right now, it's a lot of fun.