Saddle Creek
2008
Elephant Shell
About This Album
If the Lesson in Crime EP introduced Tokyo Police Club as Canadian disciples of the Strokes, then Elephant Shell finds them shedding their vintage leather jackets in favor of several different getups. Tracks like "Tessellate" and "Listen to the Math" dress themselves up with the same sort of witty, professorial wordplay of a Decemberists album, and frontman David Monks casually tosses off a word like "australopithecine" with the ease of an anthropologist. Elsewhere, the group's steady drumming and angular, post-punk guitars point listeners toward the dancefloor, even if some of Monks' lyrics are better suited for a funeral dirge than an energetic, indie rock anthem. "Meet me where your mother lies/We'll dig graves on both her sides," he sings during "Graves," a song loaded with images of "blackened brains" and "fingernails beneath the dirt." Such a track would be disturbing if Monks' bandmates didn't churn themselves into an energetic froth, their chopped-up guitar riffs and syncopated snare hits sounding refreshingly bright against the lyrics. Tokyo Police Club haven't emphasized this side of their personality before, but they've also never had the chance to stretch their legs and inject some variety into their spazzy rock.
Track List

Disc 1 (try tracks 2,3,4,5,6 and 9)

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Disc 2

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