Looking Too Long at the Waterfall: 30 Albums by Deerhoof

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There is so much I like and respect about Deerhoof. I like that they have managed to go from underground noise-jammers to pitchfork band to indie elders while still remaining recognizably themselves; I like that they (for the most part) keep their albums concise; I like that they see no problem with mixing left-of-the-dial experimental music and the classic rock songs that everyone has heard twelve million times. I don't like that they took all their music off Spotify but I do respect it. But that doesn't really capture my feelings about Deerhoof. It's like...

Do you guys know that thing where if you stare for a long time at a waterfall--or anything that's constantly flowing in one direction--and then you look away, suddenly everything else will seem like it's moving away from you in the opposite direction, even though it's actually stationary? That's what listening to Deerhoof feels like. They're just such a strange band, and they're strange in a way that no other band is strange, and also in a way that after while just starts to feel right, and starts to change the way you understand all other music, and really all the rest of everything.

And there's something so utopian about the way that Deerhoof seem to be from an alternate universe, because it's an alternate universe that they are kindly inviting us to visit. Like, that tweet up there and all these reviews are kind of flippant and ironically detached because that's really the only way I know how to be, but just know that I love all of this with my whole heart, and I loved getting the chance to do it!

This one ended up getting expanded significantly in its migration--I knew that the 'hoof had released a new album recently, but I didn't realize how much stuff they had out there that I hadn't covered. They're the best currently-active American rock band!

FISK ERA

Dirt Pirate Creed (1996)

1/10

💀⭐💀

GIMMICK: fully improvised, sucks

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 0%

REVIEW: Okay, look. I'm willing to admit that I might be a philistine. Like, there's certainly some noise--and some noise rock--that I like, and I certainly have no beef with improvisational music, even free improvisation, but, like--

--this is the kind of wacky improv "freakout" that I thought we left in the sixties, and we should have honestly never tolerated. By which I mean, this is self-indulgent and wanky and ugly and most of all boring, for everyone except maybe the people playing it, which just makes it worse. There is, I guess--I guess--a kind of good keyboard thing on the first track. And that's it.

Luckily, however, that kind of good keyboard thing would turn out to be the template for the entire rest of this band's career! But otherwise... Deerhoof have a couple of EPs in this same style--For Those of Us on Foot, The Return of the Wood M'Lady--and I am not going to listen to them. Life's too short.

RANKING: 30 of 30

The Man, the King, the Girl (1997)

6/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: lo-fi

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 10%

REVIEW: And now suddenly Deerhoof is a real band! With songs and everything!

They are still, however, a surprisingly normal band. You've got your loud, cute noise-pop songs and your loud, ugly noise-noise songs, and your occasional nods to classic rock (I hear the riffs to "You Really Got Me" and "Moonlight Mile"), and really that's all you need, but they just haven't gotten into that strange twilight realm that Deerhoof in its prime would come to inhabit.

RANKING: 25 of 30

Holdypaws (1999)

4/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: clonk thonk

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 20%

REVIEW: Deerhoof have now reached the next step in their evolution by ditching the feedback shit--from now on, they are just a rock band, no noise about it, and they have to be weird in more subtle, interesting ways.

And yet? Do they really succeed? No, not really! Because while now they are a straightahead rock band, they do not know how to rock. It's almost astounding how little rhythm or swing there is to this, it just kinda smacks you over and over again, which makes for an experience that's sometime compositionally interesting but never fun and often actively unpleasant.

(yo, i just read the description of this one on the deerhoof bandcamp page, and the reason there rhythm section on this sucks so much is that satomi literally did not know how to play the bass when they recorded this, and also greg inexplicably decided to replace all the live drums with keyboard-controlled samples of ringo star and keith richard drumlines, and also the actual keyboard sounds on this were literally done using a calculator. this band.)

Actually, the only song I really like on here is "Satan" (aka "meow meow meow meow"), which incidentally is a slow ballad without drums. Oh, and young Satomi's voice is somehow even higher than I'm used to her sounding. I don't mind it, but I totally understand how someone would!

RANKING: 28 of 30

Halfbird (2001)

5/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: prog

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 15%

REVIEW: Okay, let's get one thing straight: the bit in "Six Holes On a Stick" where Satomi sings "You could be so cute / With just one little flute" and then plays the world's goofiest flute solo is maybe the most adorable moment in all of rock 'n' roll. That said, unfortunately the rest of this album doesn't really measure up. The vibe here is kind of like a very American-indified version of Japanese cabaret-prog, like After Dinner in flannel. Which doesn't work! The best thing about those Japanese cabaret-prog acts was how tightly composed they were!

RANKING: 27 of 30

DIETERICH/COHEN ERA

Reveille (2002)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: supper's ready

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 55%

REVIEW: "The trumpet scatters its awful sound over the graves of all lands, summoning all before the throne. Death and mankind shall be stunned when nature arises to give account before the judge."

Yes, this appears to be... a concept album where Deerhoof attempt to deploy the Book of Revelations in the service of leftist environmentalism? Putting aside the questionable implications of trying to deploy Christian apocalyptic imagery for... pretty much any reason... this honestly whips. And they really nail the majesty and woe of it all. Actually, this is a huge leap forward for this band, marking the first time they managed to convey and sort of emotional narrative. I mean, the first four tracks of this thing send you on an absolute journey. And as well as being more emotionally and dramatically interesting this is also more musically interesting! You've got the early-Hoof classics (extended noise jams, lo-fi pop, cute punk) along with fun little nods to folk balladry, glam rock, and (thematically appropriate) Christian liturgical music. A real growing-the-beard moment, in other words. Yes I did just use a TVTropes-ism, yes I am cringe, let's move along.

RANKING: 15 of 30

Apple O' (2003)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: beatles

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 40%

REVIEW: Was no one going to tell me Deerhoof was a good band??? Was I just going to have to find that out on my own???

(seriously: "My Diamond Star Car", "Blue Cash", that stuff makes life worth living)

EDIT: Revisiting my old, tossed-off, gee-wasn't-that-neat review to give some greater context: this album is "Deerhoof does The Beatles". And specifically Deerhood does the early Beatles, like, no extended noise jams or prog suites here, there are some happy, jangly guitar-pop songs. I mean, there's even an apple on the cover!

RANKING: 10 of 30

Milk Man (2004)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: electronic

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 40%

REVIEW: Deerhoof had flirted with electronic chill before--thinking "The Moose's Daughter" off Holdypaws--but they really go all in here, "Desapareceré" is almost downtempo. And I mean if you're an indie rock band looking to make electronic bachelor pad music 2004 is the time to do it. But most of the rest of this album still has big loud guitars on it so don't worry!

I apologize if this review seems a bit rushed, I'm kind of distracted looking over my shoulder and checking if Milk Man is following me. I feel like he's part of the Creepypasta Expanded Cinematic Universe--he also lives in that creepy mansion in the woods with Ben Drowned and Slenderman and Jeff the Killer where they kidnap teenage girls and then fall in love with them (IYKYK).

RANKING: 11 of 30

Bibidi Babidi Boo (2004)

7/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: live, free (as in you don't have to pay for it)

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 5%

REVIEW: I think that maybe the thing I have the most affection for Deerhoof about--and I have affection for Deerhoof about a lot of things--is that while they may be a high-minded experimental rock band with radical politics, they are still a rock band. Like. They rock! They have, like, riffs and shit! And the riffs are plentiful and enjoyable here on this kinda-lo-fi live outing, from the era when being an indie band still meant playing dive bars--I am particularly fond of "Rainbow Silhouette of the Milky Rain" and "Milking". They also so a weird no wave/free funk thing on "Panda Panda Panda", though, so this is still a band that makes you think. For good or for ill.

RANKING: 22 of 30

The Runners Four (2005)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: double, and also they all swap instruments

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 70%

REVIEW: The thing about Deerhoof that I have discovered is that the longer I listen to it the more I like it. Like, after 10 minutes or so I get into the Deerhoof Zone where every wacked-out that Satomi and the gang are doing sounds absolutely transcendent--it occurs to me that this "everything is perfect and meaningful" feeling is actually somewhat like the experience of taking psychedelic drugs, but that's a discussion for another album review. So this is my favorite Deerhoof album, by dint of being the longest Deerhoof album. But I haven't listened to all of them yet, so watch this space!

EDIT: Only thing I gotta say is that this isn't my favorite Deerhoof record anymore--there are other ones that are way better!

RANKING: 4 of 30

Green Cosmos EP (2005)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: orchestral, Japanese

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 50%

REVIEW: This record is one of Deerhoof's wildest, most rockin' releases so far, and also is the first one to feature orchestral arrangements, which is the kind of joke I trust these guys to make. It's also almost entirely in Japanese--only English lyrics I hear are "Come see the DUCK!!!", which to be fair is all you ever need. It's also great--I wish it were longer, but at the same time I don't know it if would were if it were, this thing really is just a little punch in the face.

RANKING: 8 of 30

Untitled EP (2006)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: random, once again free (as in you don't have to pay for it)

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 15%

REVIEW: Lil' grab-bag EP. Half live versions of previous 'hoof favorites (of which "Wrong Time Capsule" and "Scream Team" are best) and half covers... and the covers are great, worth the price of admission alone, a price which once again is $0. "The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill" is a wacky jazz thing, "Going Up the Country" is completely faithful except Greg sings it in his precious little voice, "Lose My Breath" is gorgeous, like single-handedly justifies My Bloody Valentine's entire career, and "There's a Kind of Hush" is just, like, wow. Someone remembers Herman's Hermits! I thought noone remembered them. That's a joke about how the guy in that band was named "Peter Noone". Just a bit of "Peter Noone" humor for all you "Peter Noone" fans out there.

RANKING: 19 of 30

INTERREGNUM: DEITERICH ONLY

Friend Opportunity (2007)

10/10

❤️⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐❤️

GIMMICK: pop

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 45%

REVIEW: I remember this album getting super hype back when I used to read Pitchfork, and I think I kind of reflexively ignored it for that reason. I was a fool; this is amazing. And the pop production even works!

EDIT: Once again revisiting a tossed-off review, because this thing absolutely did not deserve it--this album is amazing. Yes, the production is way clearer (although apparently still done DIY by the band on their laptops), but more importantly Greg & Co. have embraced beauty this time around--hence heartbreaking jazz ballad "Whither the Invisible Birds?", genuine singalong rock anthems "Matchbook Seeks Maniac" and "The Galaxist", rhythmic toe-tappers "The Perfect Me" and "+81" and Television-style guitar epic "Look Away". And I mean, this is still a weird band. This album also has "Kidz Are So Small" on it. But what I think this band has figured out is that you can play to the big crowds and big emotions without sacrificing your own idiosyncrasies, because--CRUCIALLY--normal people are actually all really weird in their own particular ways!

(that, among many things, is actually what Ulysses is about)

RANKING: 1 of 30

DIETERICH/RODRIGUEZ ERA

Offend Maggie (2008)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: led zep

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 50%

REVIEW: Haven't had a chance to talk about it on here yet, so: let's talk about what a great drummer Greg Saunier is! He is very good at giving us that steady, pounding, tight beat we crave, but also very willing to do weird things on top of it. So good!

And what he's doing here is... channeling John Bonham? Yeah, so many of these songs have this big viking-blues stomp on them--and he's not the only one, you also get a lot of huge hard rock riffs on here too. In fact, if "Jagged Fruit" wasn't a conscious effort to make an avant-rock version of "Stairway to Heaven", then I'll... well I'll do something. And Deerhoof is also indulging in Zep's folk-rock side--this is the first Deerhoof album to feature significant amounts of acoustic guitar since, like, ever. The title track and "Family of Others" almost sound Celtic at times! And if I haven't praised it enough, this album is wonderful--the stretch starting with the title track and ending with "Eaguru Guru" is great. Which, BTW, that statement doesn't make any sense if you're looking at the track listing over to the left--for some reasons the versions of these albums I'm listening to have all the tracks in different orders. Weird.

RANKING: 3 of 30

Deerhoof vs. Evil (2011)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: tracks released one-by-one on various media websites and you have to have a scavenger hunt to find all of them; also, Brazil

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 60%

REVIEW: On "Secret Mobilization" Satomi sings, "This is not based, this is not based", and we know that's a lie--this is very #based.

(deerhoof are from the bay area and this came out in 2011 so they 100% knew what they were doing there, and remember this is before that term had been appropriated by the alt-right) And while Deerhoof may be from San Francisco, on this album they have COME TO BRAZIL. That's right, while we've always know that they've been MPB-heads this is where they really go for it, and it totally works--you know that Clube da esquina is in heavy rotation at the Deerhoof House.

(i like to imagine that everyone in this band lives together in a big house and are best friends. that would be the only bay area group house where people actually clean and do this dishes)

As well as Brazil, there's also a good amount of Japan on here--Satomi's still singing in Japanese sometimes, "Hey I Can" sounds like something off 増殖 X∞Multiplies, and unrelated but I also gotta point out just how incredibly catchy "Super Duper Rescue Heads!" is.

(also they do NOW but ten years ago american indie kids hadn't heard of japan or brazil so you could blow their minds by copping some Caetano or Hosono on your songs. this is also what Animal Collective did--come to think of it, AnCo is another "mediocre noise act becomes good pop act" story. Deerhoof is way way better though)

RANKING: 6 of 30

Breakup Song (2012)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: funk

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 45%

REVIEW: As my mama always said, "It ain't no goof if you've got the 'hoof."

The thing about Deerhoof is that I'm pretty sure what they do is write a bunch of fairly normal pop-rock songs and then fuck with them in various ways, such that they all come out sounding subtly wrong. Which, ironically enough, makes Deerhoof an incredibly listenable band--the more you listen to them, the more their off-kilter approach to music starts to feel natural and logical and the less the rest of the world makes sense. For this album they appear to be putting some funk on their usual style--some of these songs sound like the band War, believe it or not.

EDIT: Just gotta point out: this album's very good. Don't think I adequately captured how amazing a concept "Deerhoof funk record" is.

RANKING: 12 of 30

La isla bonita (2014)

5/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: recorded in ten days; reverb

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 10%

REVIEW: Man, what happened? This is murky, vibey, reverb-y, and above all boring millennial playlist filler--on this record Deerhoof remind me of the other Deerh band, and that's never a good thing. Only songs I really dig are "Paradise Girls" (dance beats and ambiguously feminist lyrics) and "Exit Only" (punk beats and ambiguously anti-american lyrics). That's two songs! This band can do better!

RANKING: 26 of 30

Fever 121614 (2015; recorded 2014)

7/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: live in Japan

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 5%

REVIEW: Okay, not only do they play "Come See the Duck" on this album--this often-silly band's silliest song--but they make it the big climactic set-closer and they get everyone to sing along. I love this band so much.

This wasn't part of the assignment, but Deerhoof are apparently one of those "you gotta see them live" type bands, and so I thought I should do one of their many live albums (actually once I decided that I love them I did a bunch more)--plus this has the cutest cover. Also, the idea of doing a list with 19 entries felt icky to me for some reason (lol). And this is good--Deerhoof here are definitely in punk mode here, the guitars are loud and the drums are chaotic--but unfortunately they're touring off La isla bonita and so the setlist leaves something to be desired.

But, like. Doing all these reviews, I'm like... I never want to stop listening to Deerhoof, you know? I really feel like I could listen to only this band for the rest of my life and be happy.

RANKING: 23 of 30

The Magic (2016)

7/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: garage (or abandoned office building in the middle of new mexico, as the case may be)

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 15%

REVIEW: Standard line on this album is that this is The Hoof getting back to their garage-punky roots, and indeed the guitars are loud. But lemme tell ya what, what this really is is the kind of record bands tend to make when they have been around for twenty years: a stealth greatest hits album. By which I mean: pretty much all of these songs are throwbacks to previous eras of the band. You've got:

• lo-fi garage punk a la The Man, the King, the Girl ("That Ain't No Life To Me", "Dispossessor")
• proggy noise a la Reveille ("Little Hollywood")
• classic rock a la Offend Maggie ("Learning to Apologize Effectively")
• classic pop a la Apple O' ("Criminals of the Dream")
• shout-along anthems a la Friend Opportunity ("Acceptance Speech")
• moody downtempo a la Milk Man ("I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire")
• dancey funk a la Breakup Song ("Model Behavior", "Debut", "The Devil and His Anarchic Surrealist Retinue")
• quirked-up nonsense-pop a la Green Cosmos ("Kafe Mania!", "Nurse Me")

Mountain Moves (2017)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: features

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 35%

REVIEW: By most metrics, "Your Dystopic Creation Doesn't Fear You" is Deerhoof's biggest hit. Which is kinda unexpected, because it's a very weird song! It's kind of a Deerhoofification of a 90s chillout jam, so you've got relaxed, vaguely hip-hop influenced beats paired with big sunny guitar chords (this, believe it or not, is only one of many Deerhoof songs that vaguely remind me of "Island in the Sun" by Weezer), but then some very scary noises too. And I really don't know how it got so popular--did the Awkwafina hive all come out for it or something? BTW, I know people hate Awkwafina now because The Mouse overexposed her but I actually quite enjoy her stuff--I watched all of Nora from Queens on a plane and it was good fun. She honestly reminds me of a lot of the girls I went to high school with.

Anyway, what's really weird is that there's a completely different song on this album that should have been Deerhoof's biggest hit, it's called "I Will Spite Survive" and it's gorgeous and amazing, Deerhoof have given us giant hooky pop songs in the past but this is something else, this sounds like it should be on the soundtrack of heartwarming coming-of-age movie.

This whole album, in fact, is something else. You could say that the story of Deerhoof is one of gradual expansion--they started from the fairly narrow world of improv noise and gradually incorporated more and more into their music, until they basically became a full musical universe all in themselves--but an open one, both in the sense that they invite the listener into their world with kindness, and in the sense that they're always looking for more. And they've kept expanding here, both in the very obvious sense that this the the first Deerhoof with significant collaboration from outside artists, and because they've sprinkled more influences into their sound--in addition to the aforementioned hip-hop, I also hear some reggae on here ("Con Sordido") and some western classical music ("Palace of the Governors"). I mean, like, I say that every one of their albums has a "gimmick" but that's not really it, you know? They're just always looking to find something new and make it Deerhoof.

Which brings me to the next point, that being that this is Deerhoof's 2016 election album, and specifically their reaction to the apparent incongruity between the cruel, grasping mainstream monoculture as exemplified by Trump and the beauty and kindness and creation they had seen in the countercultural underground. And so, when you think about it, opening up is exactly the right reaction--in an actual Culture War, you don't win by destroying the other culture (that's impossible anyway), you win by growing yours.

(btw again, i honestly feel kinda bad for waiting until their fifteenth album to bring up what an incredibly political band Deerhoof are, especially since they're also peace-and-love lefties and i generally agree with them on every substantive issue. i will say, though, they're very gesinnungsethik and i'm very verantwortungsethik--that's why they're artists and i'm a bureaucrat)

RANKING: 2 of 30

Surprise Symphonies (2020; recorded 1995-2020)

7/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: b-sides and rarities

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 85%

REVIEW: Kind of surprised it took so long for the 'hoof to give us a rarities comp, but I'm glad they did, because this is... well, it sure is something. In some ways I'd say this relentlessly eclectic collection of wack tracks is the peak Deerhoof experience, but, like, at the same time this is 4 the fanz, you know? Best tracks are "Symphony" songs, which I think are pastiches of various sorts of West African music, plus of course "You Will Regret", and also whatever the hell the cartoon sound collage "Dolls vs Dictators Soundtrack" is. Also... I think this album actually gave me a kind of an appreciation of this band's Fisk-era free-improv stuff, which. Honestly impressive! I didn't think I'd ever not hate that!

RANKING: 20 of 30

Future Teenage Cave Artists (2020)

7/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: the hunger games

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 80%

REVIEW: Somehow these guys are still surprising me--I never expected Deerhoof to do YA dystopia. Because that's what this is! This is another prog-rock concept album a la Reveille, only this time it's about a gang of teen renegades who make art in a future ruled by a bloodthirsty dictatorship. Same general thematic territory as Mountain Moves, but with more plot. It actually reminds me a lot of The Who's rock operas, not in the least bit because Deerhoof is now also trafficking once again in big loud classic rock riffs. Interestingly, on a purely musical level this is also one of Deerhoof's weirder albums in a long while--everything feels very ramshackle and oddly juxtaposed, which I guess makes sense thematically as well. Unfortunately, it also doesn't super vibe with me--that is, until the crushing, hypontic "Damaged Eyes Squinting Into the Beautiful Overhot Sun" and its inexplicable Bach outtro. What a cool and bizarre way to end an album!

RANKING: 21 of 30

To Be Surrounded by Beautiful, Curious, Breathing, Laughing Flesh Is Enough (w/ Wadada Leo Smith) (2020; recorded 2019)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: trumpet

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 60%

REVIEW: First half is just the 'hoof, and it absolutely slays, especially the first three tracks. Second half Wadada shows up with his trumpet and this turns into a kinda free jazz thing which is less viscerally pleasurable but still pretty good. Although the kind of jazz Mr. Smith plays and the kind of rock Deerhoof plays actually mesh pretty well together!

RANKING: 18 of 30

Love-Lore (2020)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: cover medleys

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 80%

REVIEW: Okay, first of all: I honestly just adore that they did this at all. Second of all, there are some truly amazing moments on here: "Electric Avenue", the noise-ballad take on "Wonderful" and "Rainbow Connection", the very pissed-off Jetsons theme, the B-52s interlude, and of course the version of "All Tomorrow's Parties" that ends this.

Third of all... well, this is supposed to be companion piece to Future Teenage Cave Artists, imagining what kind of music the renegade future rebel kids from that album listen to, and it turns out that they listen to songs from the past that are about the future. Yeah, this album is an accomplishment as a performance, but also just as a playlist--BTW, there are multiple "songs from Love-Lore" playlists out there if you're interested, here's two that people posted on Twitter.

And there's a sense of disappointment here, but also hope. You can hear the way that people from the past have dreamed of something better, and you can hear that they failed, but you can also still hear them, and what they are saying is: hey. It doesn't have to be like this.

RANKING: 9 of 30

Actually, You Can (2021)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: (taken from the band's official press) "DIY baroque"

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 60%

REVIEW: No, Actually, I Can't. By which I mean to say: this isn't the best Deerhoof album, or the worst Deerhoof album, or the most interesting Deerhoof album, but it is definitely the hardest Deerhoof album to play. Like, those insane prog-math-rock things they're doing on "Plant Thief"? How the hell is a human being supposed to pay that? The western classical influence that has been part of this band's sound since at least Mountain Moves has really come to the fore now, to the point that some of this could fall into my favorite genre of "literal baroque pop", but also there are just so many complex rhythm changes on here, and this is the band that's known for the complex rhythm changes!

Now, of course, the thing is that Deerhoof are, at the end of the day, human beings, maybe the most human beings of us all--and that might explain why my favorite tracks on here are the slow ballad "We Grew, and We Are Astonished", the fun tejano-rock rave-up "Scarcity Is Manufactured", and...

Well, "Divine Comedy" deserves its own paragraph. That one is legit amazing--this might be the most Full Bach they've ever gone, and what you end up with is kind of like John Linnell fronting a prog metal band, only not like that at all. Deerhoof embracing outrageous complexity is maybe something we all needed even if we didn't know it.

This band has never stopped being exciting and trying new things! Wow!

RANKING: 14 of 30

Devil Kids (2021)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: live from Ed's basement

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 10%

REVIEW: One thing about Deerhoof is that they were (are) a very Covid-conscious band, and what that means is: Future Teenage Cave Artists? Love-Lore? Actually, You Can? All of those albums were recorded with the band not actually in the same room together! They were recording their parts alone and sending them back and forth! Wild!

But this here is a document of the band actually playing together for the first time since the pandemic, although not in front of an actual audience--they livestreamed this one online. They shoulda done it in Roblox. Anyway--Deerhoof are a good band, you guys. Like, they are just so incredibly in tune with one another, instrumentally--it's like they were never apart at all. And they even do "Come See the Duck"!

RANKING: 13 of 30

Miracle-Level (2023)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: smooth like Suntory Toki... also the whole thing about this one is that it was supposed to be Deerhoof's first album in a real studio with a real producer only it turns out the "real producer" was selected entirely because he owned an instagram-famous cat that Greg really liked. this band.

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 20%

REVIEW: Man, you know what the miracle is? Deerhoof. It's absolutely crazy that these guys have, by this point, been making consistently interesting rock music for 20+ years, like, nobody does that.

That said, this is definitely... well, this isn't a record for young people, you know? Like, I was absolutely blown away by the energetic pre-release singles "Sit Down, Let Me Tell You a Story" and "My Lovely Cat!", but I think my actual fav song on here might be the title track, a soul-jazz ballad that makes me think of, like, Ray Charles and Otis Redding. A lot of this album occupies this laid-back, bluesy groove that makes me feel like sitting on the back porch and appreciating the fundamental goodness of creation, even the more uptempo numbers. And that's just it, right, Greg Saunier may be a terminal twitter addict but even so everything this band does is suffused with so much love, for their craft and for the people who it means something to.

Oh, and this whole album is in Japanese. Did I not mention that?

RANKING: 7 of 30

The Free Triple Live Album (2024)

8/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: triple, live, free (as in you don't have to pay for it)

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 10%

REVIEW: Well, Greg does in fact say "arigato" here. And, perhaps because he has spent the past thirty years hanging out with a native Japanese speaker, his pronunication is pretty good! Only... the show was in fact recorded in Berlin, and his German pronunciation is... not up to the same standard.

"Thirty years"... the big thing about this show is that the band was joined on a couple of songs by Rob Fisk, the guy who founded the band in the first place back when these guys were San Francisco crust punk oogles. Back when it was actually possible to do something cool in San Francisco. The world has changed so much since then. But Deerhoof is still there! Deerhoof, in many ways, seems like they stubbornly refuse to admit that the world has become a colder, crueller place around them. And that is why they are the best band out there right now.

RANKING: 16 of 30

Noble and Godlike in Ruin (2025)

9/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: avant-garde

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 90%

REVIEW: First reaction is: HOLY SHIT THEY DID IT AGAIN. Second reaction is: well, late-career Deerhoof highlight Mountain Moves is their Trump I album, and it's interesting to contrast it with this, their Trump II album. Because, see, Mountain Moves featured Deerhoof singing the poppiest song of their entire career about how "you can outlive your executioner", whereas this is one of the least pop things this band has ever done. Or more concisely: the guest rapper on this album is Saul Williams, whereas the guest rapper on Mountain Moves was Awkwafina.

But again, guys: they did it again. This album is amazing! It's also, like, intense: it's almost unrelentingly dissonant, with some of this band's noisiest production and these odd flashes of orchestration that only make it feel more chaotic. Even the somewhat sunshiney "Immigrant Songs" descends into a squall of pure noise. This album owes a lot to 20th century avant-garde classical music, actually--and yet it's not a punishing thinkfest, because while being unrelentingly dissonant it's also unrelenting danceable! This album sees the band reaching back to the latin funk of Breakup Song, only moreso--you can boogie to these tunes. Like, check out "Sparrow Sparrow". (i will say, interestingly, that this is the least rock-based Deerhoof has ever been, especially considering that they are notable as one of the noise-math-type bands that pays the most tribute to classic rock radio stuff)

And, well, what does it mean. Well, I do a guided meditation from YouTube sometimes where the person leading it promises to "never leave [me] in dissonance", and this album in many ways is the refutation of that idea. And as stated above that's completely literal, but also... the ability to live while left in dissonance, to not constantly crave resolution, to be able to dance to dissonance--that's how you get an actually functional society. I mean, on a political level--what does fascism promise if not the collapse all dissonance into a forced, comfortable, stifling, eternal harmony? Why does politics exist if not to create a society in which dissonance does not necessarily have to resolve--because the resolution of dissonance in real life always involves bloodshed.

RANKING: 5 of 30

Deerhoof & The Sound Sanctuary (w/ The Sound Sanctuary) (2026)

3/10

⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: deerhoof's plantasia

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 95%

REVIEW: Some people play music for their plants. And then some people have the plants play music for them, which is apparently what's going on here--someone hooked a bunch of gewgaws up to some plants that made them make noise based on the electrical impulses in their cells, and then had a bunch of quirked-up indie types improv over it. In Deerhoof's case, that's some drones and Satomi rambling in Italian (?). Whatever. This is kind of not a real alnum. Like, it doesn't count.

RANKING: 29 of 30

Divine Schism (2026)

6/10

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

GIMMICK: chronotransduction

UNCANNINESS PERCENTAGE: 95%

REVIEW: Um. Okay what the fuck is this.

I will tell you what this is. This album starts with the thirteen-minute "Sun Like It Hot", which is a bunch of seemingly-improvised snatches of vocal melody from Satomi, layered over a ramshackle march rhythm, some synths, and glockenspiel. The overall impression is "leitmotifs in search of an opera", and "opera" may in fact be what's happening, because there are also a bunch of tracks where Greg tells a spoken-word fairy tale about a magical land called "Stylantis" where everyone has mommy issues. There are a bunch of big loud jazz chords ("Let Us Out"), but also the synths and glockenspeil never go away, this is by far the most keyboard-dominated Deerhoof album. The only tracks I would call "songs" are "Double Bass Drums", which takes the approach of the rest of the album but pairs it with big fun rock riffs, and "Master Mademoiselle", which is an honest-to-goodness electro-pop track.

This album is, I'm gonna be real with you, not all that pleasant to listen to. But at the same time. How many other bands drop their strangest and most experimental album thirty-two years into their careers?

That last question is not rhetorical. I'm actually asking.

RANKING: 24 of 30

Overall Ranking & Final Thoughts

1. Dirt Pirate Creed (barely counts)
2. Deerhoof & The Sound Sanctuary
3. Holdypaws
4. Halfbird
5. La isla bonita
6. The Man, the King, the Girl
7. Divine Schism
8. Fever 121614
9. Bibidi Babidi Boo
10. Future Teenage Cave Artists
11. Surprise Symphonies
12. Untitled
13. To Be Surrounded by Beautiful, Curious, Breathing, Laughing Flesh Is Enough (w/ Wadada Leo Smith)
14. The Magic
15. The Free Triple Live Album
16. Reveille
17. Actually, You Can
18. Devil Kids
19. Breakup Song
20. Milk Man
21. Apple O'
22. Love-Lore
23. Green Cosmos
24. Miracle-Level
25. Deerhoof vs. Evil
26. Noble and Godlike in Ruin
27. The Runners Four
28. Offend Maggie
29. Mountain Moves
30. Friend Opportunity