"You wanted a hit," James Murphy sings on LCD Soundsystem's third album, This Is Happening, "but that's not what we do." And sure enough "You Wanted a Hit," a leisurely, nine-minute-plus strut, is not a hit. Most of This is Happening, which the band began streaming online yesterday, is similarly unhurried. Even the most immediate songs on This Is Happening aren't particular immediate: Album opener "Dance Yrself Clean" begins with three lo-fi, bass-free minutes before the beat finally drops and the cleansing begins.
As if to vindicate Murphy's "we don't do hits" mantra, This Is Happening's boorish lead single, "Drunk Girls," the worst song Franz Ferdinand never wrote, is the unequivocal low point of an album that otherwise consistently delivers, albeit on its own terms. Or perhaps the song was given singles honor simply because it's the only one of these nine cuts that clocks under the five-minute mark.
Despite Murphy's suggestion, nobody really comes to LCD Soundsystem looking for hits, anyway: They come for the grooves, and on that level Murphy doesn't disappoint. "One Touch" pairs his robotized vocals with an equally robotic beat in the spirit of mid-'80s Wire, while "I Can Change" is a trunk-rattler with shades of Gary Numan, and "All I Want" re-imagines The Strokes and Interpol for the dancefloor. Hits? No. Jams? Yes. Expect to see this one top plenty of year-end lists this December.
