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No Mas Image
Metascore
76

Generally favorable reviews - based on 14 Critic Reviews What's this?

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  • Summary: After receiving a good reception from the demo release, "Jamz n Jemz," the duo from Providence, Rhode Island, releases its full-length debut on Luaka Bop.
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 14
  2. Negative: 0 out of 14
  1. Javelin's No Mas presents 15 handmade jams that might not get the party started, but should at least sustain the hazy sunshine of 2009's "Deadbeat Summer" through summer 2010.
  2. The duo are clever producers. The album doesn't have the lopsided minimalism that's typical with the collage approach. Percussion is only as crisp as the leads and fills the spectrum evenly.
  3. For the most part, the cutesiness is kept just controlled enough to make the songs intriguing.
  4. It's mellow, maybe a little too mellow, but the duo seems to be okay with that. And although the layout of the tracks flows in and out of consciousness and doesn't really take the record anywhere specific, it is considerably cohesive.
  5. Javelin don't yet possess the same kind of wit and invention of their most obvious forbearers, but there's enormous potential here, and the biggest compliment that can be paid to No Más is that it will sound best when reduced down to an audio tape and shoved into one of the boomboxes that Langford and van Buskirk so slavishly worship.
  6. Under The Radar
    70
    This tenuous house of musical cards may be scotch-taped together, but it's the exhilarating feeling that it might fold in on itself at any moment that renders it so compelling. [Spring 2010, p.70]
  7. No Más has three-fifths as many tracks in the same amount of time [as Jamz n Jemz], and for the most part, each track outstays its welcome.

See all 14 Critic Reviews