| Hungry Ghosts | ||||
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | October 14, 2014 (2014-10-14) | |||
| Recorded | September 17, 2012 – May 31, 2013[1] | |||
| Studio | Tarbox Road (Cassadaga, New York) | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 41:57 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Producer | ||||
| OK Go chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Hungry Ghosts | ||||
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Hungry Ghosts is the fourth studio album by Americanrock bandOK Go. It was released on October 14, 2014, under the band's ownParacadute record label and was produced byDave Fridmann andTony Hoffer. The band's first studio album since 2010'sOf the Blue Colour of the Sky, it is aconcept album whose lyrics are mostly about the pros and cons of a relationship. The album has a moreelectronic and modern approach than their previous studio albums. The album was recorded over three years at Dave Fridmann'sTarbox Road Studios inCassadaga, New York. The album received generally favorable reviews from music critics and charted at number 74 in theBillboard 200.
The band has released five official singles from the album with accompanying music videos: "The Writing's on the Wall", "I Won't Let You Down", "Upside Down & Inside Out", "The One Moment", and "Obsession". The music video for "The Writing's on the Wall" was nominated in two categories at the2014 MTV Video Music Awards, winning Best Visual Effects, but losing to "Turn Down for What" byDJ Snake andLil Jon for Best Direction. The music video for "I Won't Let You Down" was nominated for, and later won,Best Choreography at the2015 MTV Video Music Awards.
With the exception of the single "I Won't Let You Down," which was produced byTony Hoffer in Los Angeles, most of the album was produced byDave Fridmann at his New York studio Tarbox Road. Production began with the listening sessions, where band members sent in about 40 demos. They also discussed how they would produce differently from their previous records and how they would change their sound.[2] The group had spent two years writing material with no set sound in mind.[2] According to Fridmann, they decided to use a combination ofPro Tools andReason, so "everything was elastic. Everything was synced up to a Reason track, so we could edit in both worlds, and we set up the studio with five different stations. We had the main A and B studios with my stuff, and three alternate rooms so all five of us had our own workspace."[3] He described the development of the songs in an interview withMix Online:
"We'd just go from room to room. You'd work on whatever song you wanted for a while, and then you'd get tired or run out of ideas, and then you'd go listen to somebody else's room for a while and make comments on what they were doing. Somebody else would be listening to your stuff and they'd give comments back. We just kept walking around the building in a circle, commenting on each other's work and improving each other's work."[3]
The vocals were mainly recorded using Neumann U 7 andSennheiser MD 421 mics, with aNeve 8801 occasionally being used if necessary. Several guitar amps were used, including a Selmer and 1950sFender Princeton amp. The guitars were tracked with a Bock 251 mic. On the drums, anElectro-Voice 868 mic was used for the kick, a Neumann 105 for the snare, andDPA 4006s for the overheads. An E-V RE27 was used to track bass guitar. Fridmann said that "a lot of the interesting sounds on this album originated inside of Reason. We did a lot of programming, and that made it easy to transfer files; no matter what you did in a Thor synthesizer, you could take it to somebody else's Reason station and it sounds the same. Then we could speed it up, slow it down, do whatever we want."[3] FrontmanDamian Kulash also used anOP-1 synthesizer manufactured byTeenage Engineering in recording the album.[4]
Hungry Ghosts features elements ofelectronic rock,power pop[5] anddisco.[5] OK Go frontman Damian Kulash calledHungry Ghosts "pretty stylistically diverse," like their previous three studio albums, yet moreelectronic, "but not in anEDM kind of way." He said some parts of the album are "very modern", with some tracks "made almost entirely of glitchy electronic sounds", while others are influenced by 1980s acts includingPrince,INXS andNew Order.[6] Lyrically, the album is mainly about the pros and cons of relationships.[7]
The album's October 14 release date was announced May 6, 2014. A sampler four-track EP titledUpside Out was released for free on June 17, 2014. The album was available for pre-order on the direct-to-fan platform,PledgeMusic.[8]
"The Writing's on the Wall" was chosen as the album'slead single. The song received positive reviews. Its official accompanying music video premiered at theLos Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art on June 16, 2014, and made its world premiere the next day viaRolling Stone's website and OK Go's YouTube channel.[9][10] The video drew over 7 million views on YouTube,[11] which caused the song to debut at the top position ofBillboard's USBubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart[12] and in the top ten at number ten of the AmericanHot Rock Songs chart, marking OK Go's first entry on the chart.[13]
"I Won't Let You Down" was chosen as the second single from the album. The song's accompanying music video was released on October 27, 2014 through YouTube[14] and was later released as an official single on December 8, 2014. The song debuted in theBillboardHot 100 at No. 71, making it the band's first Hot 100-charting single since "Here It Goes Again", when it charted at No. 38 in 2005. The song fell out of the chart a week after it debuted.[15] The song also charted in theBillboard Hot Rock Songs chart at No. 7.[16]
The last single from the album was "Obsession". The music video for this single was released on YouTube on November 23, 2017. To produce the video, the band collaborated with the paper company Double A, and used 567 printers to create the video's backdrop.[17]
| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| Metacritic | 74/100[18] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [19] |
| Alternative Press | [20] |
| Gaffa | [21] |
| Paste | 7.8/10[22] |
| PopMatters |   [23] |
| Rolling Stone |  [24] |
| Under the Radar | [25] |
Hungry Ghosts earned positive reviews from critics. As of October 2014, the record holds an aggregated 74 of out 100 onMetacritic based on 6 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[18]
AllMusic's Gregory Heaney gave it four stars out of five, writing that with this album, "OK Go continue to impress."[19] A writer for theAlternative Press awarded it a similar rating, describing the material as "far more immediate" than their previous studio effort.[20] Scoring it a 7.8 out of ten, Hilary Saunders ofPaste opined it "may not be the musical evolution that fans sought after four years, but OK Go's bold pursuits of creativity in all media remain exciting still."[22] Chris Conaton, reviewing forPopMatters, felt the band took "two steps forward" with the album, but also went "one step back", concluding that "having three or four outright clunkers on your album seems like too many." He gave it a six out of ten.[23]
Produced by Dave Fridmann besides track 8, produced by Tony Hoffer. All songs written by OK Go.
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Upside Down & Inside Out" | 3:08 |
| 2. | "The Writing's on the Wall" | 3:33 |
| 3. | "Another Set of Issues" | 3:58 |
| 4. | "Turn Up the Radio" | 2:56 |
| 5. | "Obsession" | 3:08 |
| 6. | "I'm Not Through" | 3:36 |
| 7. | "Bright as Your Eyes" | 2:55 |
| 8. | "I Won't Let You Down" | 3:43 |
| 9. | "The One Moment" | 3:43 |
| 10. | "If I Had a Mountain" | 3:19 |
| 11. | "The Great Fire" | 4:17 |
| 12. | "Lullaby" | 3:42 |
| Total length: | 41:57 | |
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 13. | "Fight Song" | 3:07 |
| Total length: | 45:18 | |
| Chart (2014) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Japanese Albums (Oricon)[27] | 245 |
| USBillboard 200[28] | 74 |
| USIndependent Albums (Billboard)[29] | 13 |
| USTop Rock Albums (Billboard)[30] | 19 |
"Turn up the Radio" was used in Season 4, Episode 11 ("eXit"), ofMr. Robot.
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