3 out of 5

Label: Secretly Canadian

Produced by: Eric Kabisch (engineered by)

While some time passed between this and the next album, and not a lot of time between this and the previous album, Le Fé Du Cloune – Pirate effectively represents the mingling of the two versions of the Elephants heard on those releases, with some of the tracks – maybe importantly the opening ones – nailing the oddball abandon of their debut, and the rest of the disc rather comfortable in its quirk, to the extent that you realize you’re listening to a band and not some alien entity which has learned folk and klezmer muzak.  Either approach works (although the nutiness of the former edges out the latter’s more, eh, “mature” sound), but the blending of the two makes for an up and down listen, with some non-starter non-music tracks at album’s end sorta killing it.

But – whoof – the starting slew of five or so tracks are a hoot an’ holler of energy, flipping and flopping between almost serious lyrics and complete nonsense while blending the group’s trademark juvenile humor with swirling banjo strums and various wind instruments and jangly percussion.  The middle stretch of the disc isn’t bad by any means, it just lacks the spark of inspiration from on-high, resulting in some repetitively structured songs.  In this sense, and with the disc coming out within a year of the former, Pirate almost seems like leftovers from the previous session, with all the good stuff front-loaded onto the experience.

If this is your only or first JE experience, it’s still uniquely them and will undoubtedly make an impression (good or bad, depending on your tolerances, of course…), but their other albums are better outings overall.