Momus: Folktronic

The difference between Momus' career as a musician and his career as an Internet essayist has never seemed narrower than on Folktronic, a collection of self-described "plastic folk." Over the course of 20 tracks, the singer, songwriter, and wit also known as Nick Currie examines the meaning of folk music in the digital age, most often by recasting folk forms in synthesized settings with lyrics that serve as a kind of audio commentary on the process. The best, most insightful songs (and here there's no difference) come early. "'Moon Of Alabama' is my favorite country tune," Momus sings on "Mountain Music," adding, "It's got lyrics by a Communist and music by a Jew." Momus' point—that the search for authentic folk music only reveals its bastard origins—is made throughout Folktronic, but his concern with the state of the traditional and the modern is just as prominent. In "Finnegan The Folk Hero," he crafts an ode to a renegade HTML programmer, suggesting one way in which the old and new might coexist, but on "Folk Me Amadeus," the sound of Rednex's cornpone techno novelty "Cotton Eyed Joe" has him in tears. It's all so clever and thought-provoking that it's almost possible to overlook that, in most other respects, it's not especially good. Momus' last album, the fan-commissioned Stars Forever, found him stretching out musically in a way that suggested his music might someday match his wit. Here, the electro-folk tires itself out in a hurry, despite the inclusion of highlights like "Handheld," a touching exchange between an electronic device and its owner. It might be the definitive moment for a performer who has assumed an unassailable position as the "Weird Al" Yankovic of the grad-school set.