The Go! TeamProof of Youth
(09.2007, Sub Pop)
7.5/10
I was having a really hard time getting through this album, but I was determined. This morning I decided to try donning my oversized speaker headphones to see if they could tame the messy sound of Proof of Youth that was coming out of my PowerBook. Much to my surprise, it worked wonderfully! This album is not meant for listening to on crappy speakers. It needs some quality in order to sort out the myriad of complexities happening in any given millisecond. Even with nice headphones, Proof of Youth is still hard to get all the way trough. It feels like drinking the syrup from an entire box of melted Otter Pops and then finishing that all off with some cream soda and a huge wad of Big League Chew. If you squeezed all the energy out of each spectator at a high school football game and topped that off with full marching band and pep squad it might equal the spastic marathon that is Proof Of Youth. There are a bunch of stand-out tracks that I love, its just really difficult to listen to them all back to back, unless you are the energizer bunny. It's a great album for working out to, having an improv dance party of epic proportions with your little sister, or possibly while cleaning your house. The album saw quite a few contributors including Chuck D, The Rapper's Delight Club, and Solex. It's an enjoyable album with each of the tracks sounding great in isolation, but I'm going to have to give it a 7.5 for being as overbearing as a mother-in-law.
-Sassigrass
