Album Review: Rip It Off - Times New Viking
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*Today's two person review of Rip It Off by Times New Viking is brought to you by Sage and Ethan.**Sage's Rating*: 7.8*Ethan's Rating*: 6.5*For fans of* Apples In Stereo...if that "stereo" was a set of 10-year-old laptop speakers.*Single* The Apt 
ST: Today we have Times New Viking's Rip It Off, their third studio album.EE: I have to admit, I hadn't heard of these guys before. I thought their name actually was Times New Viking Rip It Off. I'm a little disappointed.ST: So never having heard them before, what did you expect ... and what did you think about what you heard?EE: Well, I expected them to be sort of pop-punky, and I was right. What I didn't expect was for the music to sound like it was being played through a walkie talkie over one of those tin-can phones.ST: Welcome to Times New Viking: "music so tinny it can give you tetanus."EE: It's almost an art form that they could get music that sounds so strained and blown out. My 4-year old daughter has this 12-dollar Barbie karaoke machine that she uses to sing "Bohemian Rhapsody" on..ST: Aww, how cute...EE: ...and seriously, her squealing "skabba boosh canna do a fanago" is recorded in higher fidelity than these dudes.ST: I'll admit, it's off-putting. We live in a world where audiophiles get into fistfights over vinyl versus digital, or 320 kbps vs. FLAC, or with which 8,000 dollar headphones you can best hear Steve Tyler's lips cracking. In come Times New Viking and basically give the whole lo-fi vs. hi-fi argument the finger.EE: When you put it that way, it is pretty punk. When you've flipped the bird to everything already, I guess the only thing left is flipping it on your own music.ST: So, getting past the mixing and audio quality, which with these guys is definitely on purpose, what do you think of the music itself?EE: Well, that's the thing. The first time I listened to this, I almost threw my headphones away cause I thought they were broken. I kept listening and listening ... I knew there were interesting little indie-rock songs in there, I just had to keep pushing past the static.ST: You are describing a big portion of what TNV fans feel is a major part of their appeal ... you have to work at it to get to the good stuff. So much that comes out these days is so overmastered, it becomes apparent that there weren't any real songs under there to begin with. I find a band so confident in their music that they UNDERmaster it exhilarating.EE: There's definitely a confidence here and a maturity, even if it is by all accounts male/female shout-pop. It takes a certain kind of band to understand the power of a pop song, but do it in such a way that it will never be popular.ST: I think that's the perfect summary of TNV ... they love to dangle the carrot of pop, hooks, anthems and sing-a-longs to keep you moving forward ... until, before you know it, they've led you into their own scuzzy little punk wonderland.EE: However, I'm still not totally sold with this whole purposeful deconstruction through purposefully deconstructing my speakers (which happened by the way; literal smoke came out of my laptop). To me, the tinniness and static is less a problem for me (and my delicate ears) than it is a blanket solution for them. I think they use it almost as a crutch. Like someone who uses way too much self-deprecating humor ... it's funny at first, but soon you start to think they actually believe they suck.ST: I wouldn't take it that far, but I will admit the poor recording quality does smack more of a gimmick than something that actually adds to the music itself. However, for me, it's one of the few gimmicks bands like TNV have left ... and a refreshing slap in the face to all those wanna-be famous indie-rockers who "damn the man" but would secretly do anything to be on an iPod commercial.EE: Okay, okay. Honestly, I'm just a wuss. My ears can only take so much. I'm filing this under Interesting Listen, one that was worth the effort, but I probably won't be going back.ST: Maybe you're right. Me, I'm gonna keep digging though ... every time I do I find another treasure.
ST: Today we have Times New Viking's Rip It Off, their third studio album.EE: I have to admit, I hadn't heard of these guys before. I thought their name actually was Times New Viking Rip It Off. I'm a little disappointed.ST: So never having heard them before, what did you expect ... and what did you think about what you heard?EE: Well, I expected them to be sort of pop-punky, and I was right. What I didn't expect was for the music to sound like it was being played through a walkie talkie over one of those tin-can phones.ST: Welcome to Times New Viking: "music so tinny it can give you tetanus."EE: It's almost an art form that they could get music that sounds so strained and blown out. My 4-year old daughter has this 12-dollar Barbie karaoke machine that she uses to sing "Bohemian Rhapsody" on..ST: Aww, how cute...EE: ...and seriously, her squealing "skabba boosh canna do a fanago" is recorded in higher fidelity than these dudes.ST: I'll admit, it's off-putting. We live in a world where audiophiles get into fistfights over vinyl versus digital, or 320 kbps vs. FLAC, or with which 8,000 dollar headphones you can best hear Steve Tyler's lips cracking. In come Times New Viking and basically give the whole lo-fi vs. hi-fi argument the finger.EE: When you put it that way, it is pretty punk. When you've flipped the bird to everything already, I guess the only thing left is flipping it on your own music.ST: So, getting past the mixing and audio quality, which with these guys is definitely on purpose, what do you think of the music itself?EE: Well, that's the thing. The first time I listened to this, I almost threw my headphones away cause I thought they were broken. I kept listening and listening ... I knew there were interesting little indie-rock songs in there, I just had to keep pushing past the static.ST: You are describing a big portion of what TNV fans feel is a major part of their appeal ... you have to work at it to get to the good stuff. So much that comes out these days is so overmastered, it becomes apparent that there weren't any real songs under there to begin with. I find a band so confident in their music that they UNDERmaster it exhilarating.EE: There's definitely a confidence here and a maturity, even if it is by all accounts male/female shout-pop. It takes a certain kind of band to understand the power of a pop song, but do it in such a way that it will never be popular.ST: I think that's the perfect summary of TNV ... they love to dangle the carrot of pop, hooks, anthems and sing-a-longs to keep you moving forward ... until, before you know it, they've led you into their own scuzzy little punk wonderland.EE: However, I'm still not totally sold with this whole purposeful deconstruction through purposefully deconstructing my speakers (which happened by the way; literal smoke came out of my laptop). To me, the tinniness and static is less a problem for me (and my delicate ears) than it is a blanket solution for them. I think they use it almost as a crutch. Like someone who uses way too much self-deprecating humor ... it's funny at first, but soon you start to think they actually believe they suck.ST: I wouldn't take it that far, but I will admit the poor recording quality does smack more of a gimmick than something that actually adds to the music itself. However, for me, it's one of the few gimmicks bands like TNV have left ... and a refreshing slap in the face to all those wanna-be famous indie-rockers who "damn the man" but would secretly do anything to be on an iPod commercial.EE: Okay, okay. Honestly, I'm just a wuss. My ears can only take so much. I'm filing this under Interesting Listen, one that was worth the effort, but I probably won't be going back.ST: Maybe you're right. Me, I'm gonna keep digging though ... every time I do I find another treasure.
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