Dorks And Losers

The true beauty of Flight Of The Con­chords is in know­ing that the band is actu­ally a com­edy act. With­out being in the know one would prob­a­bly lis­ten to the Welling­ton, New Zealand duo and think them to be the worst band ever. I refuse to believe that effect is by design, since it com­pletely defies the tra­di­tional logic of being in a band to make good music. Who prac­tices the gui­tar — or any instru­ment for that mat­ter — just to evoke that com­mon facial expres­sion of utter dis­gust and con­tempt, for what their ears were just sub­jected to?

To this writer’s amaze­ment, there is a huge mar­ket for The Con­chords’ brand of music. From the ear­li­est begin­nings, Bret McKen­zie and Jemaine Clement struck the right chord with lis­ten­ers. This cult audi­ence later expanded with the help of a self-titled HBO show that per­fectly visu­al­ized the band’s humor and sensibility.

Hav­ing pre­vi­ously watched the show, lis­ten­ing to The Con­chords’ self-titled LP feels more like an audi­ble refill of my Con­chords on the rocks. Despite my seem­ing lack of enthu­si­asm for lis­ten­ing to some­thing I’ve already seen with my eyes, there is still much to be enjoyed from the com­bi­na­tion of McKenzie’s clue­less and Clement’s dead­pan vocal stylings; as expe­ri­enced through the pseudo-techno apa­thy of “Inner City Pres­sure,” the sym­pa­thetic feel-good joy of “Think About It,” and the sort-of-gritty ghet­toness of “Mutha’uckas.”

It was dif­fi­cult to lis­ten to many of the songs with­out hav­ing my brain con­stantly try­ing to refer to the episodes each was fea­tured in. The series opener began with what has to be both the most roman­tic and unro­man­tic — maybe even insult­ing — song ever in “The Most Beau­ti­ful Girl (In The Room)” that has Clement vie for the affec­tions of a gor­geous blonde, only to be rejected and later on — in the episode “Sally Returns” — won­der whether she was the one that got away. It is per­fectly ser­e­naded in the hon­est and gen­uine mar­i­tal romance of “Busi­ness Time.” The off­beat, yet steady lyrics of “Hiphopopota­mus Vs. Rhy­me­no­c­eros” grace the episode “Mugged” where the two get, you guessed it, mugged and later con­front their attack­ers, which is also my favorite.

Flight Of The Con­chords show­cases their bril­liance on two fronts. One is musi­cal, because each song is unde­ni­ably pleas­ant, while the other is con­cep­tual, because each song is filled with the most amus­ing storytelling.

[photo via Com­edy Cen­tral]

[photo via Sharp Notes]
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Track list:

1. Foux du Fafa
2. Inner City Pres­sure
3. Hiphopopota­mus vs. Rhy­me­no­c­eros
4. Think About It
5. Ladies Of The World
6. Mutha’uckas
7. The Prince Of Par­ties
8. Leggy Blonde [feat. Rhys Darby]
9. Robots
10. Boom
11. A Kiss Is Not A Con­tract
12. The Most Beau­ti­ful Girl (In The Room)
13. Busi­ness Time
14. Bowie
15. Au Revoir

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