Everything is different and everything is the same on
Oooh-La-La!,
Crash Test Dummies' first album after a six-year hiatus. Different because
Brad Roberts, assisted by
Antony & the Johnsons' producer
Stewart Lerman, composed the bulk of the record with old toy instruments, relying in particular on the Optigan, an electronic instrument that came crammed with rhythmic presets. Each preprogrammed rhythm represented a different musical style, so
Roberts wrote accordingly, finding an impressive number of songs within these sounds: whittling “Paralyzed” from a gauche ¾ jazz sway, “Not Today Baby” in a cabaret shuffle, “Lake Bras d’Or” in a continental crawl, crafting “Now You See Her” out of a flapper jitterbug, and constructing “What I’m Famous For” in hyper-country 2-step, something that takes full advantage of how his baritone echoes
Johnny Cash. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine