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David Longstreth isn't quite trying to make things easy for his listeners on Bitte Orca, but there's far too much pleasure in this music for its eccentricities to put off anyone who is open to its gleeful, eclectic, internationalist heart.
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As relatively good as most of Bitte Orca is, 'Stillness Is The Move' alone gives us reason enough to be optimistic: should Longstreth pursue his newfound fascination with mainstream music further, it's proof that the Dirty Projectors are capable of evolving into a far better pop band than their experimental selves ever let on.
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Ultimately Bitte Orca is definitely a pleasing follow-up; it just isn't necessarily the supreme breakthrough many had hoped for.
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Bitte Orca isn't a record that'll reduce many to tears, except perhaps of awe. But when something's so astonishing in every other respect, we can allow for that.
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Somehow the band makes it work, though, pulling all those disparate sounds together in a unified style that's all the more glorious for its strangeness.
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FilterDespite its wandering parts and spacious production, Bitte Orca is a precise groove, almost medical in the way it delivers its complexity with such simple terms. [Spring 2009, p.100]
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Weird but exhilerating outing from Williamsburg Hipsters.
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Bitte Orca signifies something exciting and all too infrequent in popular music: striving for a sound that doesn't have a definite audience.
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MojoThis is fresh music, making exciting shapes with primitive resources, and though some will find Longstreth's keening bleat and bravura deconstructions show-offy there are constant flowerings of devastating prettiness, and when all the singers blare in unison the beauty they summon is almost overwhelming. [Jul 2009, p.100]
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Not only will you hum snatches, you'll parse lyrical bits, too: a basement-dwelling twentysomething high on Gatorade in an underpopulated housing development, a waitressing job for Solange Knowles.
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Clever, original, complicated, sometimes frustrating but more often revelatory, it will, given time, uncover its manifold delights.
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The 2009 Projectors have adopted a more enjoyable model, thanks in part to Longstreth holding back that horn.
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The result is the most thoroughly engaging entry in the Dirty Projectors catalog and one of the most singularly engrossing albums likely to be released this year, a triumph in sustained creative restlessness.
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Here, it stands behind so many other newly apparent strengths--a testament to the leaps and bounds Longstreth has made as a songsmith and Dirty Projectors have made as a band.
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Bitte Orca is made of nine distinct and powerful songs, and perhaps that is what makes it more inviting than earlier albums.
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Bitte Orca is the kind of album that is best taken from start to finish, where the songs and musical themes are allowed to grow, endear and impress.
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Q MagazineMany may not have the patience to follow its somersaults. Those who do will be richly rewarded. [Jul 2009, p.121]
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They've done it here, and Bitte Orca is close to a masterpiece.
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Longstreth's prickly surface belies a bright pop center: tart, sweet, and gushing all at once.
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Bitte Orca is an unorthodox listen; racking your brain and melting your heart all in the same instant, and that is something to appreciate.
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Over nine indispensable tracks, Bitte Orca forges a more perfect union between eccentricity and accessibility.
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The only thing Dirty Projectors' fifth album leaves me wishing for is a fifth rating star to wedge in.
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Via the fluttering sketches of David Longstreth's early solo releases and 2007's remarkable Black Flag quasi-tribute album, Rise Above, they arrive at this confounding, beautiful record.
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While still retaining that exacting focus that has made Dirty Projectors the unplaceable enterprise that it is, Bitte Orca is merely the sound of an extremely talented group of musicians tweaking and, to an extent, reinventing their approach, stepping a little further away from left field.
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Still, as a whole, Bitte Orca feels nothing less than a modern equivalent to Talking Heads' Fear Of Music or Scritti's Cupid & Psyche 85 –art-rock with intellectual rigour, borderless curiosity, and no fear of the mainstream. Pop, by any other name.
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Under The RadarIn an era of scripted and calculated music, the fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants Dirty Projectors thrill at every blind turn they barrel through. [Summer 2009, p.65]
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 106 out of 120
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Mixed: 6 out of 120
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Negative: 8 out of 120
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Dec 1, 2011
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eeJul 15, 2009
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Mar 4, 2021