How Can a Mouse Be Dangerous? Like This...

If you've not yet had the pleasure of listening to any of DJ Danger Mouse's musical creations or collaborations (he's responsible for The Grey Album, half of Gnarles Barkley, and the production on Beck's Modern Guilt and The Black Keys' Attack and Release), you've been depriving yourself of some amazing music. For a taste, listen to what he does to Jay-Z's "December 4th."

Here's the original:

None too shabby. However, here's what DJ Danger Mouse (with some assistance from The Beatles) can do with a song of that caliber. Notice the change in emotion. Gone is the over-produced, tacky swell of strings. Gone is the phony bravado to be replaced with something much more heartfelt, organic, and frankly, far superior.

Now Dj Danger Mouse is back with an equally controversial project (as you can imagine, neither Jay-Z nor EMI, who holds the rights to the music of The Beatles, were overjoyed by Danger Mouse's appropriation of their music). This collaboration, which ropes together Sparklehorse and David Lynch, as well as a slew of musicians, is called Dark Night of the Soul, a very appropriate title for a very dark album. However, it's also very good. Before it descends into gothic rock, the first few songs indicate that Danger Mouse has not left behind the influence of The Beatles nor of The Beach Boys. At times creepy, at times depressing, but always inspired, you can find the entire CD streaming at NPR here:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104129585

However, due to some legal issues, the CD has not yet been released, unfortunately. Here's the second and third tracks of the album (two of my personal favorites). The first features Gruff Rhys of The Super Furry Animals and is called, "Just War." The second is "Jaykub" and features Jason Lytle.