I typically listen to a CD seven or eight times before turning in a Tiny Mix Tapes review. But listening to this CD was such a dehumanizing experience – it sounds horrid, and I couldn't nail exactly what I hated about the music. Each listen births a barrage of new annoyances: from the instrumentally proficient but bland arrangements, to synth noises that could be invigorating when added to a fully orchestrated piece but are just perturbing on their own. The band doesn't stay put in one single annoying genre. They jump from house music to ambience to other forms of techno I never fathomed and can't stomach.
Finally, while listening to heartbeep synth droplets and cartoonish clicks and whistles on "Slime Shuns Sunshine," I came up with an apt metaphor. You know those Maxell CD cleaners from the mid-'90s that played shitty video game soundtracks when you put it in the player with that robotic female voice that told you when it had finished the cleaning job? That is what Yip-Yip sounds like in a nutshell, except the female voice never interrupts, and they pepper their cheesy instrumentals with synthesized shit noises.
The band creates soundtracks to fake video games. Really annoying fake video games. "24 Tubes" wallows into the breakdown music that typifies the final challenge at the end of a video game's level. I'd imagine the band had the final battle with King Koopa in mind when they broke out the cartoon-turd-sound-emulation synths to compose this one. Then the song melts into a cheesy Dirty Vegas-inspired groove, delving into thicker layers of sonic puke. The rest of the disc follows in similar migraine-inducing fashion.
This one's so bad, I'm throwing it in an incinerator. I couldn't take the risk of throwing it out. If a homeless person picked through my trash and found this CD, it would be inhumane.
1. Candy Dinner
2. Munch Much Mush?
3. Slime Shuns Sun Shine
4. Superfeet
5. Double Dolphin
6. California Fart
7. Luminous Dudes
8. Noodles
9. 100 MPH Fishmobile
10. Rath Chan: Axe Jamm
11. Pony Up
12. Situation Tally
13. 24 Tubes
14. Birth Herd
15. Keeper Of The Seal
16. High Heel To Mammal III
More about: Yip-Yip
