Focusing more on the duo’s defining harmonized guitars than the intricate production of their last two efforts, it is far more in the vein of their second album Classics than LP3 or LP4. That record, titled Magnifique, was met with a divisive reception among fans.
They also rewarded fans with the release of comeback single “Cream on Chrome” and the announcement of their long-awaited fifth album. That all changed last year as Ratatat burst back on the scene, booking major festival sets at Coachella and Governor’s Ball before announcing a worldwide tour.
With only whispers of progress and the occasional show for encouragement, many fans were starting to worry that the band’s consistently stellar output had dried up. After dropping their excellent fourth album, hospital aptly named LP4, no rx in 2010 and touring heavily, the acclaimed electronic instrumental duo of multi-instrumentalists Evan Mast and Mike Stroud went mostly radio silent on a follow-up. Magnifique doesn't show a ton of artistic growth or progression it's more of a rebranding that tightly focuses on their strengths and passes them to the consumer like a sharp, swift punch to the brain and feet.The last few years were an uncertain time for fans of Ratatat. "Everest" features a particularly well-crafted beat that pops in and out of the guitar'n'synth mayhem atop it, making the song (and the rest of the album, for that matter) good for closehe way they intended. They sound uniquely live, but their clicking, stuttering rhythms are definitely electronic and would be difficult, if not impossible, for a live drummer to produce. Often, Ratatat's music is deceptively simple in particular, Mast's beats are more interesting and intricate than they sound at first. A slight hip-hop vibe also pops up from time to time, most clearly on "Crips"â insistent bass and rattling beat, but also in the spoken word interludes that dot the album.
The bittersweet naïveté that floats through the album also recalls a more roughed-up version of Plone's nursery rhyme electronica, particularly on "Cherry," the sleepy epic that closes Ratatat and pays tribute to the band's former name. Stripping away much of the excess instrumentation and frills that adorned the previous two albums, Magnifique mostly sticks to the basics on the way to becoming the duo's most brightly immediate record yet, bouncing between sunny, hook-heavy uptempo tracks that have the kind of manic energy that could lead people to tear off their shirts and seriously lose it on the dancefloor and relaxed, soft rock-inspired songs that serve as a nice soundtracktatat plays like an indie spin on "Aerodynamic" from Daft Punk's Discovery, albeit with a slightly less arch feel. Though it was released five years after its predecessor LP4, a gap that might lead one to think that big changes were brewing, 2015's Magnifique delivers everything fans might expect from a Ratatat album. Though there have been slight stylistic diversions on the albums that followed, especially on 2008's LP3, their core of neatly wound, double-tracked guitar melodies, thrumming basslines, and tight beats has remained intact. The duo of Mike Stroud and Evan Mast have stayed remarkably true to the sound they developed on Ratatat's first album, 2004's self-titled affair.
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