4 out of 5

Label: You Are Not Stealing Records

Producer: Stealing Orchestra & João Maya

Another dose of genre overload from Stealing Orchestra, though this time around things lean more toward goofy than groovy.  But keeping things in line, and interesting, is the polish the band lends to the whole affair.  Stereogamy is 100% lean as compared to the more wandering ‘Incredible Shrinking Band;’ though it might not offer the range of emotions that record explored (it still had the same underlying notion of fun, but it slowed down at points to be ponderous), the fact that track to track ‘gamy just hums by without a bump sells the whole thing.  The groovy parts are like a less obnoxiously French Stereolab, and the playful parts – video game samples, polka/circus tunes – are as skronky weird as whatever other mash-up band you’d want to reference.  However, Stealing Orchestra seems to know how far to let that leash out and when to reign it in from becoming too much of what it is.  So something that could just be a ‘hey, I know that’ tribute track like ‘Star Wars and Twilight Zone themes’ incorporates enough core elements to tickle your earhole but filters it completely through the band’s identity, such that it is not the original theme, nor is it Stealing Orchestra playing the theme, but rather it’s an SO track named what it is with familiar elements, like a jazz riff on a classic standard.  And of course, that sense of variation and fun and album awareness means we also get out odd man’s out that properly shake up the vibe, such as the electro punk of ‘Bugsy is a Punk Rocker,’ which, once the vocal sample kicks in, is exactly what it sounds like.

Well produced, expertly sequenced and played, Stereogamy is the right way to do this funky mash-up thing, without a Spin article and forced identity to sell it, just making the music accessible and yet challenging, easy to listen to and yet layered, fun and yet rewarding.