Products of a rich Chicago dance scene, Greenskeepers successfully flip between genres on the group's latest release, Pleetch.
The group covers disco, electrofunk, soul, pop, electroclash, trip-hop and house styles without batting an eyelash and carries off each foray with a sly smile.
The foursome orchestrates a variety of funky ambient grooves, dabbling successfully with various styles. Each song has a unique essence, largely because of the heavy implementation of their Chi-town comrades as guest singers. This makes the album a refreshing listen.
"Keep it down" is the second single and could be classified as uplifting trance-pop. The track combines traces of hypnotic disco and the breathy vocals of Superjane's DJ Colette. It's a likely candidate for a summertime chill-out compilation.
Greenskeepers' earlier material was experimental and quirky. This is a more mature and well-rounded dance album. It retains elements of their prior oddball approach and fuses in their trademark eccentric humor. This is one of the best aspects of Pleetch. We are taken on an excursion from the dance-orientated songs to a punkesque two-chord frenzy.
"Filipino Phil" is a jumpy left-field foot-tapper, a psychedelic dirty roadhouse blues track that plays like Tom Waits at his surreal best.
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"Man in the house" is an odyssey punctuated with a punchy riff akin to The Hives or Talking Heads that is aesthetically similar to boho rock bands such as The Dandy Warhols.
This sort of groundless conceptualism is a breath of fresh air in the usual closed-mindedness of dance culture. By substituting the posturing with tongue-in-cheek humor, Greenskeepers reminds us of how intrinsic having fun is to the music experience.
Like LCD Soundsystem and 2ManyDJs, Greenskeepers' avant-garde but self-deprecating style is more entertaining and original than many of the popular, revered dance DJs.
"Lotion" is sung nonchalantly in a highly seductive voice over a moody stripped-down arrangement. It's a mesmerizing song which slips in random wordplay such as "The night is very cold/I'm feeling kind of weak/I think I'll make myself a cap from your right buttocks cheek." The song is an ode to the fictional serial killer Buffalo Bill from "Silence of the Lambs," borrowing one of his characteristic lines for the chorus, "It puts the lotion on the skin/Or else it gets the hose again."
Pleetch is an innovative and accessible work. Although it is classified as dance, even the most hardened hip-hoppers would find themselves gently bobbing their heads to the funky bass and overtures of soul.
Pleetch
Greenskeepers
Grade: A
