A Perfect Album - Dungarees by Mojohand.
Exploring albums that need no skip button
An album full of vintage sounds that helped cure me of my cynicism. The New Jersey-born, Brooklyn-based band Mojohand has released what I consider to be a perfect album. What are my criteria for a perfect album? Simple: no skips. You hit play and let it ride.
The throwback vibes are strong on this record. Whatever your favorite era of rock and roll, blues, soul, americana, country, folk, and so on, they’ve likely been blended into one or more of these 11 songs that give you a warm sense of familiarity without crossing the line into sounding like a corporate-label Frankenstein built to cash in on “nostalgia sells.”
I’ll admit that on my first listen of the opening track, “Long Way Home,” while scrolling through the band’s images on social media, I was cynical. I thought to myself, “Here we go, another band dressing the part and trying to portray themselves as from another era.” I was ready for an extremely cliché album that checks off all of the “remember when?” sounds of yesteryear.
“Long Way Home” was pretty good… but I was sure the album would start to fall flat pretty fast.
So, what’s next? Probably some hipster hand-clapping, foot-stomping track? Actually, no. Instead, Mojohand moves into more serious, peaceful, and melancholier territory with “Santa Fe” and “Hey Rita.” My expectations of over-the-top nostalgia-core were challenged and replaced with tasteful restraint. They were setting the mood, not blowing out the speakers. A gentle reminder that you don’t have to come out of the gate at 100 mph. Instead, you can let the engine warm up. Cruise for a little while. Finish your coffee, roll the windows down, and enjoy the ride.
As the album livens up with its more dance friendly tracks “Trouble” and “It’ll Be Okay,” I’m still scrolling, now reading about the band and their history. Dungarees is their third album, and the internet claims they’ve been “...playing in every bar, backyard, and basement willing to have them for the past seven years.”
It’s becoming clear why the songs are written, performed, and even sequenced in the track list so well. This is another example of one of those “new” bands that has been writing, recording, and performing for nearly a decade, just long enough to become an overnight success.
There’s a skill to crafting a setlist that captivates a live audience full of people who are hearing you for the first time. Dungarees certainly captures the feel of seeing a band for the first time and watching them roll through a confident, well-paced live set. It never overwhelms you. It eases you into the mood, lets you get wild on occasion, and gives you the perfect moments to take a breather and grab another drink.
Oddly enough, the song that solidified for me that this band isn’t the joke I originally assumed is their comedy track, “Talkin’ Bushwick Brooklyn Blues.” A very self-aware and self-deprecating look at those all too familiar stereotypical hipsters. Sure, they’re singing about Bushwick, but every music town has its own flavor of this same person.
My “New Music I Like” bingo card did not have “self-aware hipsters” on it this year. But here we are.
Should it have taken me seven full songs to let go of my cynical, image-based assumptions about this band? Definitely not. The only other artist I’ve felt this type of skepticism toward was, embarrassingly enough, Sturgill Simpson.
I was so jaded by all of the fake and phony “country” acts that I hesitated to accept Sturgill as the real deal. But after seeing a live performance and giving his album A Sailor’s Guide to Earth a proper front-to-back listen, I realized I should never let the phonies out there keep me from taking a chance on a new artist. They just might be the real deal.
Funny enough, Sturgill’s album, like Mojohand’s Dungarees, was also his third release. Not sure what that means, but it’s a fun coincidence.
Now that I’ve gotten past all of my personal hangups about what’s “authentic” versus what’s manufactured, Dungarees is closing out with the same consistency and quality it started with. And just for fun, right when it feels like things might be getting too serious, they wrap up the album with a lighthearted track that poses the eternal question we’ve all asked at some point:
“Am I in love… or am I just hungry?”
Yes, indeed, Dungarees by Mojohand is what I consider a perfect album.
On second thought, maybe it’s not just perfect. Maybe it proves that nostalgia doesn’t have to be hollow. Those old sounds and styles are awesome, and Mojohand is a band that knows exactly what to do with them.
Travis Wright is the host of the “I’m a fan of…” podcast. If you enjoy music and comedy, be sure to subscribe to the podcast and check out the You Tube Channel. Thanks!
