The first work attributed solely to
Ariel Pink since the late 2000s and his first solo album,
Pom Pom finds an uneasy balance between his early days and his later albums with
Haunted Graffiti for 4AD. With slightly murkier production values than either
Before Today or
Mature Themes, the sprawling double album nods to
Pink's home-recording days, but features a far wider cast of collaborators -- including
Spiritualized's
Jason Pierce and rock polymath
Kim Fowley -- than any of his previous music. Similarly, these songs encompass some of his most engaging pop and some of his most aggressively weird music. While
Pom Pom isn't as fragmented as the collections of his early work, the sides of
Pink's music often feel polarized, especially compared to how well they complemented each other on
Before Today and
Mature Themes. The album's pop side might fare slightly better, at least on the first few listens: "Put Your Number in My Phone" may be even catchier than
Before Today's "Round and Round" or
Mature Themes' "Only in My Dreams" (and the fact that it appears a quarter of the way into
Pom Pom suggests
Pink is aiming for a disorienting listening experience), while "Dayzed Inn Daydreams" delivers more gauzy AM pop that sounds like it was channeled from the early '70s. Elsewhere, the breezily disturbing "Lipstick" could be an '80s new wave ballad written by
Brian DePalma, and "Picture Me Gone" mixes mortality and technology into something equally witty and bittersweet. Some of
Pom Pom's more overtly wacky tracks, like the novelty rock and musique concrète collision of "Dinosaur Carebears," take a while time to warm up to, and some, like "Exile on Frog Street," are just too long. However, for every song like these, there's a "White Freckles," a fine tip of the hat to
Frank Zappa's legacy. Likewise,
Pink's
Fowley collaborations feel like the passing of the torch from one eccentric to another, whether it's "Plastic Raincoats in the Pig Parade"'s surreal sugar high, "Jell-O"'s whitebread satire, or the risqué surf-pop of "Nude Beach a Go-Go" (
Azealia Banks' version of the song on
Broke with Expensive Taste was even more successful and surprising in context). Indeed, sex is never far away on a
Pink album, and "Sexual Athletics"' mix of cartoonish lust and romantic longing feels like
Mature Themes in a nutshell. Though the way
Pink zigs and zags on
Pom Pom can be dazzling or confusing depending on listeners' patience, in its own way it's one of the best representations of what makes his music fascinating and occasionally frustrating.