CD Reviews

Peeping Tom

Peeping Tom | Ipecac

By ANDREW GRAHAM | July 18, 2006

2.0 Stars

Sure, there’s a low-grade shock factor in Norah Jones’s crooning the word “motherfucker.” But Peeping Tom’s mall-punk-caliber “freaking out the squares” quotient is diminished by the fact that the squares aren’t at the party. The project’s progenitor is former Faith No More frontman Mike Patton, a notorious musical boundary pusher, and for this album he’s assembled some of non-mainstream hip-hop’s finest, as well as chanteuses like Ms. Jones and Bebel Gilberto. But the effect is as scattershot as the guest list, and refrains like “you’re still a piece of shit” and “you suck” offer all the depth of a cranky teenager’s MySpace blog. I suppose the bridgeless, repetitive opener to the “Play me” chorus in “Kill the DJ” (which conjures Jerry “Laaady” Lewis more than any real hostility) and the docile hip-hop of “How U Feelin?” might distress some parents. So do Limp Bizkit and countless other rage-rockers and gangsta rappers.

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Peeping Tom:http://ipecac.com/

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