The Wake

By now you’ve probably heard the name, now it’s time to face the music. Only a completely nonsensical moniker like Gnarls Barkley could be responsible for the scatterbrained perfection that is St. Elsewhere (Downtown/Atlantic). Is it hip-hop? Gospel? Funk? Doesn’t matter—classify it simply as your next party record.

Gnarls Barkley is the pet project of the oft muumuu-clad, Goodie Mob crooner Cee-Lo Green, and wunderkind DJ Danger Mouse. The unlikely duo make music like a manic preacher praising heaven’s bad-ass beats. Nearly three years in the making, St. Elsewhere is a well-tuned catastrophe, sprinkled with schizophrenic confections that tackle feng shui, necrophilia and the Violent Femmes.

The disc’s opener, “Go-Go Gadget Gospel,” leaps from the speakers like a church ballad on speed, swelling, swirling and threatening to tear down the roof and incur God’s wrath. Cee-Lo’s over-the-top lyrics such as, “Shapeless, formless, heart is enormous/I’m free, look at me/freedom in hi-fidelity!” only add to the massive sound’s weight.

Then it stops, suddenly, as most of St. Elsewhere’s songs do, and slides into “Crazy,” an infectious old-school-meets-new-school smash hit. “You think you’re in control?/I think you’re crazy/Does that make me crazy?/Probably,” Cee-Lo howls indecisively, as Burton reinforces the theme of glamorous insanity with his wildly unpredictable tempos and textures.

Balancing guilty pop perfection with surprisingly smart song construction, the album clocks in and out just long enough to both get the party started and keep it going without overstaying its welcome. When Cee-Lo demands “Come rock with me baby/dance with me darlin’/step with me sweetheart/the world is watching,” you’ll gladly obey.