Gnarls Barkley is Good!

Continuing the trend of great bands working against the contemporary model and status quo of record releases, Gnarls Barkley took it upon themselves to release their new album, The Odd Couple, without prompt on March 18 instead of its original release date April 8. Never the ones to let themselves be confined in any way, and always working to keep us on our toes, Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse (who ?uestlove calls "the last great living and WORKING soul singer under 40 and the most creative and intuitive producer maniac music has seen in a sec," respectively) have dropped 13 body-rockin', mind-bogglin', psycho-soul tracks into our laps while we were all preoccupied with Barack Obama and race or whatever (more on the later). I'm personally elated about the decision as I was getting antsy having to wait so long. I'm listening to it right now and can say that it would've been worth the wait. At first glance, it seems to have all the emotional energy and intensity of St. Elsewhere and maybe even a harder edge. That's already been made clear from the first two singles from the album, Run and Who's Gonna Save My Soul.

So now they're not only genre-bending but music-industry-rule-breaking. They're signed to indepedent label Downtown (which also includes Mos Def, Justice, and Art Brut among others). Way to go Downtown. Artist control!