At first glance, this album (and some may even say HORSE themselves) may be looked upon as farcical. Between Nintendo character references (such as ‘Birdo’, the first track, and ‘Cutsman’ on their last album, R. Borlax), the video game sound effect style of the keyboards, and the often comical lyrics, it’s easy to see why one would give HORSE only a passing listen.
But upon further inspection, one will see that HORSE has made a cohesive, concise effort with this album. In comparison to their previous efforts, The Mechanical Hand shows better musicianship, and an overall more streamlined sound. Erik Engstrom’s 8-bit style of keyboard playing forms a bizarre yet soothing mesh with David Isen’s crunched-out guitar, while vocalist Nathan Winneke’s voice fluctuates between that of an almost epic-sounding warlord (‘Lord Gold Throneroom’) and a frustrated, confused, teenaged, underwater sea mammal (‘Manateen’).
Throughout the album, listeners are peppered with recurring themes of underwater animals, various abysses, gold, quails, and vultures. Along the way, we’re treated to the brief instrumental track ‘Heroes Die’, which opens up with the sounds of swords clashing and arrows flying from their bows, the sad story of a man who has replaced his ‘wounded parts’ and become devoid of feeling in ‘A Rusty Glove’ (though the track ends in the quizzically comedic line ‘Now I’m going to go and get a burrito’), and are invited into the chamber of Lord Gold in ‘Lord Gold’s Throneroom’, which opens with the sounds of lovers amidst that which lovers do, with lyrics to parallel the theme. The closing track, ‘The Black Hole’, pulls all the recurring themes together into an epic clincher, proclaiming loudly to ‘face the stars or the abyss’.
At a few points, the album slows down a bit too much, and a couple of the songs seem to be stretched a bit further than really required, but overall, I find that this album really showcases HORSE the Band’s overall abilities in both composition and an understanding of how to make an album flow. While Nathan’s final words on the final track (‘It’s so amazing’) may be a bit of an overstatement, this is still a damn good album.