Four years following Here Comes the Cowboy – and just a decade following his breakthrough with the recently re-issued 2 – Mac DeMarco (who has meanwhile become a TikTok star, so to speak) indulges Five Easy Hot Dogs more explicitly than ever to non-binding idleness.
The instrumental album Five Easy Hot Dogs has become, so to speak, the relaxed background soundtrack with which Real Estate might end their vacation: DeMarco’s sleepy, dozing, playfully sparkling signature guitar playing is accompanied by minimalistic rhythmic patterns from the can and a few spluttering synth dabs, always strolling through the dreamy sketches somehow melancholically and nostalgically.
It’s captivating and pleasant, no question – also structurally appealing and unconventional, especially since the songwriting wants to work on a purely imaginative emotional level. Is weightless and effortless Five Easy Hot Dogs In a way, it has become an ambient album that adequately implements its ambitions of the instinctive road trip with a step back.
Conversely, this also means: No moment stands out from the meandering, no melody or hook explicitly sticks, there are no highlights or amplitudes or actual arcs of tension. Everything sprinkles non-binding.
Actively consumed, the 35 minutes stroll along the border to boring uniformity – passively appreciated, however, DeMarco delivers a thoroughly atmospheric, entertaining score in his comfort zone, which with latent complacency always wants to run along without any problems. Either way, the result is not bad at all for a second – but unfortunately always a little bit too irrelevant.
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