The Cars – Move Like This – 2011
And ironic title, considering that when The Cars played live they were like watching a Disney animatronic band.
Move Like This is exactly what one would expect from The Cars. Driving mid tempo, synth driven songs that could have been recorded in 1983.
Where Door to Door showed a band that was clearly ready to be done, Move is the opposite. There’s nothing to lose for the guys. Egos are dispensed with. It’s just time to make another, template cut, album.
Some tracks sparkle, “Blue Tip”, “Too Late”, “Sad Song”, and the ballads find their way without being obnoxiously “inventive”.
In fact, “Sad Song” is a near perfect rip of “My Best Friend’s Girl”. Handclaps, driving bass, provided by Jacknife Lee, swirling synths, aural space. It’s a welcome old friend. As is “Free”, which continues to mine the same Carsian tropes. Considering how often the band has let me down for their love of Ocasek’s more experimental, arty pursuits, this is welcome. (Much like the recent Devo reunion album was)
Ocasek actually channels Orr’s softer, higher register on “Soon” and, he creates a nice blend of the two of them. It’s a sweet and gentle piece that evokes a gentler, less controlling aspect of the band. But it is unfortunate that the most sludgy piece is called “Drag on Forever”. Cuz it does. (And it sounds a lot like a Cars version of a Monster-era R.E.M. song…..) As does the middling, “Take Another Look” which is covered in the stench of the 80s, like it’s a song desperately seeking a soundtrack over whose credits it’s crying to be played.
For the most part, Move Like This fits nicely in the catalog. Not as great as Heartbeat City, Candy-O or The Cars, but so so so much better than Door to Door and superior even to Shake it Up, although without that album’s massive single.
Grade: B
ASide: Blue Tip, Sad Song
BlindSide: Soon
DownSide: Drag on Forever, Take Another Look
