Boingo (1994) - Oingo Boingo

If you're a fan of the band's earlier sound, you may take a while to warm up to this album—but Boingo stands up to repeated listenings

Boingo, the last studio album by the now-defunct band Oingo Boingo, is in many ways an unusual last effort. Throughout their years together, the band (fronted by lead singer and composer Danny Elfman) was always tough to classify—a combination of punk, ska and pop, often with tight harmonic vocals and punchy brass. They always seemed to be trying something new in the latest album, which may have been one of the reasons they were never universally popular despite a diverse and extremely loyal fan base.

If there's one pervading theme that runs through the entire album, it is "freakishness"—the outsider's sense of estrangement, despair and loneliness. This theme certainly isn't new to the band or Elfman, who has made a living over the last few years scoring films about societal outcasts, but the treatment of this theme is notable in that almost every type of social freak is represented—the mental case, the homicidal teenager, the rambling old curmudgeon, the rejected lover, the prostitute. Even the sleeve and CD art reflect this theme with their sometimes disturbing, strangely touching collages of circus freaks.

Although there's no mistaking the trademark Elfman touch, many of the tracks are heavily influenced by the atonal grunge rock so popular in the early '90s. It took me a while to warm to this album, partially because it didn't sound much like Boingo at first—there's a fuzzy, distorted sound to many of the tracks, not very palatable on first listen. The genius of this band, though, is its ability to create sounds which grow on the listener.

The tracks:

Insanity
Longtime fans of the band will be right at home with this first track—a dark, slow pulsing of horns, a fade-in of earthy jungle drums, a chorus of children, and over all the unmistakable possessed tenor of Danny Elfman. The sound clearly indicates Elfman's current work as a soundtrack composer; one could easily imagine this as a renegade song from the latest Tim Burton film. Fans will also recognize the crooked quality of the lyrics, lurking in the seamiest section of human darkness and stained with something dark that might or might not be blood:

I'd love to take you home with me and tuck you into bed
I'd love to see what makes you tick inside your pretty head
I'd love to hear you laugh tonight, I'd love to hear you weep
I'd love to listen to you while you're screaming in your sleep

Hey!
A bipolar little tune if ever there was one, "Hey!" is a combination of muttered, meandering complaints in the verses and an outright schizoid refrain, which swings between mousy vocals and screamed obscenities. The track is much harder and more "grungy" than the sound of previous Boingo albums, with lots of fuzzy electric guitar.

Mary
This is my personal favorite on the album, a ballad of a girl's journey away from ignorant goodness and into the wisdom born of experience, and the price she pays for that wisdom. The track begins with the yearning, subdued urgency of a string quartet, with the basic motif sung by the warm strings of the cello. As the story progresses, the structured sound of the quartet slowly melts and dissolves into the slow slides of an electric guitar, still repeating the motif. The lyrics are simple, but they can be deciphered on many levels:

And after a time she became so sublime
She could look in people's eyes and read their minds
Though her hands would sometimes bleed, and occasionally
She would long for her past and the memories they bring

Can't See (Useless)
Lyrically and musically repetitive, this song is nevertheless an interesting listen for its use of juxtaposition: it begins with the simplest one-two beat on a guitar, notes plucked one by one. As the lyrics become progressively more lost, blind and futile, the sound and orchestration grow more lush and complex. By the last line, "And I can't see in front of my face," Elfman's voice is so full that he's almost channeling frontman Roland Orzabal of Tears for Fears fame.

Pedestrian Wolves
Another track displaying Boingo's new, "hard" sound, "Pedestrian Wolves" is the tale of an instinctive, homicidal, suburban Homo sapiens punk and his first turn in the big city. With its chanted howls in the background, it isn't Beethoven, but you can't help thinking Alex DeLarge and his droogs might fancy a bit of this to go with the old ultra-violence.

Lost Like This
This is one of several tracks on the album to reveal strong ties to the Beatles' later work. Although the arrangement is definitely more fuzz-rock than all but the most hard-edged Beatles tune, the verses of the song bear a striking similarity in cadence to the song "Cry Baby Cry." But the chorus is vintage Boingo, with its multiple harmonies and solid brass backup. The lyrics are all about becoming comfortable with a certain outcast state and, again, can be read on several levels—including the very real possibility that the narrator is a ghost:

This place is not like anything I've seen before
The spirits move around, the houses have no doors
But I'm getting used to it
I've never been lost like this, I've never been lost like this
But I wouldn't be happy anywhere else

Spider
Blah. Sorry, Danny, but there are so many songs about unhappy breakups and halfheartedly wishing your ex happiness. This song doesn't add anything new to the already copious stew o' angst.

War Again
The "old Boingo" sound is apparent in this track, with percussive guitars, venomously sarcastic lyrics and tight vocal harmonies in the chorus—but there are echoes of the new sound in the repetitive "yeah, yeah, yeah"s between verses. The lyrics are perhaps even more timely now than when the album was released:

Don't you know we got smart bombs
It's a good thing that our bombs are clever
Don't ya know that the smart bombs are so clever
They only kill bad people
Don't you know though our kids are dumb, we got smart bombs
What a joyous thing

I Am The Walrus
Ehh. It's far from the worst Beatles cover I've ever heard, and the sound fits well with the rest of the album, but in my opinion Boingo always does better when performing its own stuff.

Tender Lumplings
Let's redefine Walt Disney as a nihilist, with some gee-tar backup:

Oh listen Tender Lumplings let me take your little hands
I'll take you from this hell-hole to the Promised Land
But don't blame me, oh children, if those promises don't keep
'Cause promises, like lives, can be bought so very cheap

And that's all there is to it.

Change
"Change" can almost be described as another Beatles cover. The track is strongly reminiscent of "Revolution 9," a composition that was, just like Boingo, released on an eponymous album. Like the interminable Beatles track it resembles, "Change" is a long sixteen minutes of lyrics interleaved with experimental sound. The track is filled with samples and snippets, like inadequately ground sausage meat:

I like my stupid life just the way it is
And the chaos that surrounds me like a flock of screaming pigs
And it hurts my brain to think of all the stupid things I've said
And if I could change the future I would change the past instead
And I'm dreaming again...

All in all, this album is a mixed bag. But when Boingo is good, it's very VERY good, and when it's bad, it's still better than most of today's bands. I don't think the grunge sound will date well, which is one of the main reasons this isn't my favorite Boingo album overall, but it definitely has its moments and is well worth a listen.

All material displayed on this website is © 2001-2009 by S. B. Houghton, writing under the alias "The Pirate King." All rights reserved.
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