OK, so, you're looking at the cover of this and thinking, 'no, they are not letting a bunch of kids cover Devo classics, grr, argh, those Kidz Bop assholes have gone too far.' No, stop right there. "They" aren't the Kidz Bop people, who have been mocked far better by other people. "They" are Gerald Casale and Mark Mothersbaugh themselves, who willingly signed with Disney to do the project because, and I'm not kidding, they thought the whole idea was really funny. And if that's not enough, the real members of Devo play much of the instruments on the album. So yes, this is mostly a Devo record. Now, one of the biggest errors in judgement Devo have made over the years is how they've taken steps to streamline and broaden their sound, because it can't all be passed off as de-evolution. On the other hand, it's kind of comforting to know that Gerald and Mark are as demented as I am. So as we explore the depths this thing reaches, it's important to remember that as idiotic as this idea was, the original artists gave it their full seal of approval for a wide release. Okay, stop crying. It's getting weird. Stop it.
So if that's Devo playing most if not all the parts in the music, then the initial impact makes it clear right out of the gate that the band adopted the dreaded "oh, they're just kids, it's not like we have to try" mentality that I'm sure the makers of the Samson cartoon probably thought. So they don't bother to process the guitars like they used to, but more than that, the synthesizers don't have nearly the brunt or gloss that the band had in the 80s, and it makes the record sound more cheaply made than it is. With the one-two punch of "That's Good" and "Peek-A-Boo" that's the first thing that hits the listener... aside from the unfortunate Nicole Stoehr, the lead vocalist for this incarnation of the band. You know what; let's get to her, just because realistically the production is the least of this album's problems.
Now, I'm not hating, and I'm sure Nicole Stoehr has a future in show business in some capacity, but jesus jumped up christ this is not it. A bright-eyed, bushy-tailed 13 year old girl has no business singing Devo songs in anything outside of school talent shows and in their creepy uncle's car. This isn't Hilary Duff here. This is music for twisted, disaffected, skeptical freaks and geeks, set to metronome beats and sung by pent-up super-nerds with a hard-on for chaos. Let a kid sing like a kid is all I'm saying. It's an unholy combination when presented like this. What's worse is that Stoehr has this weird, stilted way of handling vocal duties, which manages to sound more robotic than Mark Mothersbaugh's without any of the moxie he brought. When Stoehr goes for the "yeah yeah yeahs" on "Uncontrollable Urge," they don't feel like yeahs. They feel like what they are: a misguided kid that doesn't fully comprehend what's happening here.
Oh, it gets worse. Can you feel the excitement??
It wasn't enough to have the weird new perspective to these songs. The Spuds even went so far as to rewrite lyrics, and not just for the sake of removing references to sex, but also to remove any cynicism from the content, because, oh, those wacky kids; we can't have them questioning things. As such, the infamous "it's a beautiful world, for you... it's not for me" line from "Beautiful World" is changed to "it's a beautiful world, for you... I guess, me too." At one point, this kinda, sorta, works? "Through Being Cool" gets altered to encourage kids to not get involved in cliques (as opposed to "eliminating the ninnies and the twits") in order to be an individual- holy shit, guys, what did you do to "Through Being Cool?!" They took the shuffle beat out of it and left it as just another synth-pop track. That shuffle beat was the best part! Cut it out!
So "Uncontrollable Urge" becomes a tribute to snack time thanks to a minor switch-up, and the new lyrics about eating, um... don't really make the song all the more kid-friendly. "Beautiful World" has the whole point of the song taken away because of that one lyric change mentioned above. "Jerkin' Back N' Forth" is..... for chrissakes, look at the title; why did they even bother with it? And "Girl U Want" is now "Boy U Want" with much less metaphorical lyrics because the bigwigs at Disney thought that people could read too much into "she sings some song where you can't see; she sits at the top of the greenest tree; she sends out an aroma of unrefined love; it drips on down like a mist from above." ...hm, okay, yeah, I can see that. The point is, it's not what they're changing; it's what they're changing it to. With the new lyrics, it's a bit difficult to really pick out what the credo of the new Devo really is, since it doesn't seem to add up to an easily-placed philosophy.
Credit where it's due - some of Devo's original messages do creep through, such as "That's Good," and a lot of kids really, really could learn something from what Casale and Mothersbaugh have to say. But this muddled, batshit nuts approach to a new context doesn't make that readily apparent. It just looks like someone in either Devo's or Disney's camp wanted to play a cruel joke on the Spudboys and Spudgirls. Anyway, everyone hated it, the album flopped, the kids got disillusioned and went on to other projects away from music (which is kind of a shame, really), Devo snarked something fierce about it, and everyone moved on, trying desperately to forget this whole thing ever happened. This reviewer sure won't - think of this as Exhibit A in how not to find a new audience.
**
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