Customer Reviews
instantly became one of my top 10 favorite CDs... 
2007-12-07
I had never heard of Nellie McKay until just a couple weeks ago, when I caught a bit of her music (and interview) on NPR while driving home. The music impressed me so much I turned the car around and headed to our local Barnes and Noble. NPR often features really off-beat music, so I was pleasantly surprised to find "Obligatory Villagers" in stock.
I popped it into my car's CD player on the way home, and it has been there ever since. I am totally hooked! I have been buying records (showing my age here) for about 35 years, and have just a few favorite albums that never seem to get old. This one instantly entered my top 10 albums of all time...which is pretty amazing, considering those personal favorites go back to the 1970s!
How to describe this music? A lot of it I would class as jazz...or close to jazz...with sharp, often funny lyrics. About the best comparison I can think of would be a hybrid of Nora Jones (sound) with the Cherry Poppin' Daddies (lyrics). But even that is doing Nellie a dis-service, because her music is totally original and takes so many different forms. She also has some GREAT catchy musical hooks and elaborate orchestrations.
Just bought her first CD yesterday ("Get Away from Me") and really enjoyed that as well...but not quite as much as "Obligatory Villagers". Which means she is only getting better with time. Can't wait to hear the next one!
Cabaret Interlude 
2007-12-03
Nellie follows up her ambitious last two albums by putting on a show with some friends. The mood is light but smart, with commentary, anthems, rap, Python-esque ditties and a few gorgeous numbers.
A Musical Suite for the Ages 2007-11-27
What a short and sweet album! I think to truly appreciate it you have to think of it as two songs--Mother of Pearl and Zombie--which serve as bookends for one of the most thrilling suites of musical inventiveness since, well, I'm not sure when. Comparisons to Bohemian Rhapsody don't do Nellie justice.
The suite kicks off with McKay's shout out to newsworthy dog owner Maxine Shreck and ends with the gospel rave up Testify. In between the listener is treated to everything from sea chanties (Livin) to Latin ballads (Politan) to hip-hop pop (Identity Theft). Just in the space of one song (Testify) she goes from Mancini-style spy music to anthemic rap to SNL-horn ensemble jazz to raise-the-roof soul.
The album is incredibly well-served by McKay's choice of backing musicians, including Bob Dorough whose scratchy vocals provide a perfect counterpoint to young Ms. Nellie on Oversure and Galleon.
Give this album a couple of spins and the nifty arrangements and hook-laden melodies will stick in your head for weeks. Lyrically, McKay manages to take episodes from her own life and turn them into poetic vignettes. Like Steely Dan lyrics, they are vague enough to keep you guessing yet include enough concrete imagery to point you in the right direction.
One of the best albums of 2007!
For the Real Nellie. 2007-11-21
Having heard her first on the live recordings from her old website, the live at Joe's and Fez recordings, I am delighted and happy to hear this album. Am listening to her "Fresh Air" interview on NPR right now and am reminded of those songs...Found her official releases and listened to them...thay were alright, pop with here wit and "charm"...not nearly as good as her with a piano alone...This album for me is the debut of Nellie McKay.
Freakishly interesting is that Rachel Ray put The Dog Song on her kids compilation...eeew, but at least Ray has modest taste in music...if nothing else
Just terrible. 
2007-10-31
I followed an arc that is probably common to those initially interested in Nellie McKay. I heard "Won't U Please B Nice," sought out the rest of her stuff, liked it a lot, heard that she lies about her age, wondered how that gels with her feminism. Went to see her in concert, she was excellent but because of the stage I was looking at her back and she never turned around once throughout the entire thing. Downloaded the early release of "Pretty Little Head" (16 tracks), felt it had some very strong songs but needed editing. Found out she was leaving her label because they wouldn't let her make it 23 songs. Got the 23 song version and found it to be bloated and self-indulgent. The good songs were still good, but many were included that should never have made it past the first cut (including the off-time and off-key "Bee Charmer" duet with Cyndi Lauper). The album's nadir came with an inexplicably screamed intro and outro from "Mama and Me" which ends with her shrieking "give me a suicide pill!" at the top of her lungs then seemingly cracking up. I was honestly embarrassed to listen to this track and couldn't play the album for other people unless I was certain it wouldn't come on or the track after where she sings harmonic miaows.
Then comes along a new "album" that's really only long enough to be an EP. While the orchestrations are tight they are very bombastic, and the backup singers are almost never in sync. In Tom Waits' "Innocent When You Dream" his overlapping multi-tracks sound like joyful drunken carousing; on these tracks it sounds amateurish and poorly produced. Only one or two of these songs would have made it on her debut, and the best (with reservations, "Identity Theft") steals its opening melody from Weezer. Again, I closed the windows of my car so nobody would hear me listening to this album.
Her voice, on this album, sounds game, but lacks conviction. Almost every song sounds enough like another song or just a whole type of song that the musicianship is absent altogether. The jokes are lame and the gentleman from "Schoolhouse Rocks" that shares a few tracks with her comes off worse than Ms. Lauper on "PLH." At times she throws in complete non-sequiturs just to create a nifty rhyme, even at the expense of any meaning (her reference to Ray Bolger in "Identity Theft" is nearly as stupid as Kanye West throwing out the name "Rosie Perez" in "Good Morning" from his new LP. In fact they have a lot in common on this album because many of McKay's rhymes...don't rhyme. I think she rhymes "now" with "head" at one point).
And yet, somehow this self-indulgent misfire has garnered her best reviews ever. Pitchfork rated it better than "Get Away From Me"!
I hope everyone who believes in Ms. McKay's talent and potential will not accept this lazy work from her, and that her next album will not be so embarrassing.
Great Subversive Potential 2008-04-20
Nellie McKay has received a lot of positive press, but the further west you get of, say, Greenwich Village, the less well known she is. So I bought this c.d., way out west, with some degree of anticipation.
And the anticipation was fulfilled, and then some, on the opening number, "Mother of Pearl." Is this a slap at feminism, or a slap at those who would slap at feminism? Judging by the tag line, "I'm Dennis Kucinich, and I approve this message," I'm guessing the latter. Whichever, it's sharply written and nicely pulled off.
From there, IMO, the c.d. goes downhill.
The problems are twofold, essentially: production; and pastiche.
Production-wise, with Nellie McKay, it's all about the lyrics, and too many times you can't clearly hear them. Plus, she sings flat once too often for my taste - painfully so on the d-flat of the word "there" (after "danger") on "Testify," but also throughout the otherwise-catchy "Zombie." I was going to defend Ms. McKay at the expense of the producer, except that I see she co-produced the c.d.
But when I say "pastiche," I mean a maddening mish-mash of themes, both musical and lyrical. Take "Identity Theft," for example, supposedly this c.d.'s "masterpiece." What's it about? Is Nellie saying that we lose our identity when we go to college? Or is she saying we kill our own identities with shameless self-promotion, in search of those damned 15 minutes? Or, is the truth of the matter that one night she got especially blottoed, ranted into the tape recorder in a free-association, stream of consciousness mode of thinking, and out of that, essentially unedited, came the lyrics of this song? Just a guess, but I'll put my money on that possibility. Many ideas are fine; but one gestalt, please.
As I listened and re-listened to this c.d., I thought of Frank Zappa. Not everything Zappa did was brilliant, mind you; but Zappa got to the point where he melded his peculiar brand of doo-wop, r & b, Stravinsky and Varese into one distinct voice; and his lyrics, though "subversive," were sharp and pointed. Zappa was a legend; and I'm thinking that Nellie McKay could become a similar kind of legend. But don't kid yourselves, folks; she's not there yet. But certainly, she could get there. RC
A Heart Pounder 2008-03-07
I never get tired of Nellie McKay. She is a delight with endless range humor, intelligence and glorious music.
Obligatory Villagers 
2008-02-26
This is a pleasant enough CD but not as good as the previous ones ' Pretty Little Head' and the superb debut ' Get Away from Me'. Moor of the same really with an eclectic mix of styles as usual. Don;t like the first track much but unlike most CDs it gets better as it goes on. I find it a bit over orchestrated at times and there is a lack of faster tracks this time. Well worth a listen though.
Simon Fyffe
Really Nice 2008-01-11
I really like this one. I complained a bit about "Pretty Little Head" because it was too much and needed paring. This is short and sweet and it works for me. I love the songs, the orchestration and the players. Nice fat trumpet sound, great sax solos, and a rough and tumble feel that's endearing to me. More than just about any album I've listened to lately, I find myself replaying the songs in my head and liking it. "Testify" is truely awesome and I can't help but love "Zombie."
I also love her singing and the contrast between her and guest singer Bob Dorough - very cool. I gotta say, you don't hear stuff like this anywhere else (or I haven't)..
Has Its Moments 2007-12-26
As with Get Away from Me, I'm finding that while the entire album is interesting, there are only a few songs here that will end up in "heavy rotation" at my house. "Identity Theft" is the track I enjoy the most, though it's also difficult to resist the charms of a Nellie McKay song called "Zombie". "Oversure", a jazzy cabaret number that features Bob Dorough on vocals, is also good fun, and the "Don't Sleep in the Subway" vibe of "Gin Rummy" is quite tasty, but I'm not sure I'll listen to them more than occasionally.
Overall, my impression after a few listens is that McKay continues to be an interesting, talented artist, but one whose reach sometimes exceeds her grasp. Many of the songs here are over-orchestrated in a way that's more appropriate for a big production number, and I suspect that I'd enjoy them more if I heard her perform them live with a small ensemble. Here's hoping for a Nellie McKay live album.
