Little Dark Age
| MGMT
Little Dark Age
Little Dark Age (abbreviated as LDA) is the fourth studio album by the American rock band MGMT, released on February 9, 2018 through Columbia Records. It is the band's first album of new material in five years, after their eponymous third studio album. -Wikipedia
Critic Reviews
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Pitchfork
MGMT’s fourth album marks a shift in tactics. Abandoning the belabored excess of their last two albums, they opt for streamlined synth-pop.
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SPIN
They’re small glimpses of a happy medium on an easygoing but frustrating album—gentle reminders of why we cared in the first place.
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Rolling Stone
The psych-pop duo spool out concise tunes and a likable Luddite message on their fourth LP.
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The Guardian
After two albums of wilfully awkward music seemingly designed to lose them fans, the duo return with some unironically gorgeous melodies and a dash of hallucinogenic weirdness. 4/5.
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NME
The psychedelic indie heroes make a surprise return to pop with their fun-filled fourth album.
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Paste Magazinehttps://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2018/02/mgmt-little-dark-age-review.html
Though they don’t want to do all the work for them, they give them enough sweetness and beauty in their work to engage the maximum number of listeners. They want you in their corner. All they ask is that you slip this treat under your tongue and hang on tight. It’s gonna be a wild ride.
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Pretty Much Amazing
A record that is doomed to enjoy the benefit of the regret of the critics who panned Congratulations and also to enjoy the inevitable backlash against the backlash. A record more than good enough to earn these accolades.
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Glide Magazine
While pop songs may bore Goldwasser and VanWyngarden, they may have become even more bored with hearing how they’re a one album wonder, and Little Dark Age is sure to remedy that.
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Consequence of Sound
The neo-psychedelic duo lapse back into a sardonic mode that sounded much better in 2007. C.
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The Advocate
By the end, you'll likely be exhausted, thrilled and spent — like encountering a contact high.
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American Songwriter
The album earns its outsized ambition through some genuinely excellent songs.
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The Line of Best Fit
Over a decade into their seemingly infinite existence and MGMT still haven’t lost their appeal.
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The Dartmouth
In any case, this otherwise enjoyable album is slightly muddled by a few songs that I’ll invariably skip each time I choose to listen to “Little Dark Age.”
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Music OMH
Having reined in their experimental tendencies and focused on a common goal, the boys are most definitely back in town.
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Spill Magazine
A middling effort from a band who showed so much promise when they first arrived on the scene a decade ago.
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Chicago Tribune
“If everyone’s confused, which door do we open?” MGMT asks. That’s called a cliffhanger ending, and the music is strong enough to make worthwhile the wait to see how it turns out.
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Black Squirrel Radio
You can tell MGMT really paid attention to all of the tracks coming together and I’d say they are making a comeback, considering that their last LP was not a fan favorite.
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Exclaim!
It is, in some ways, an auditory microcosm of the band's career up until this point. Its first half features some of the group's sweetest pop confections since those massive singles, while its second delves into the muggy Barrett-isms of their more recent work.
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Northern Transmissions
Little Dark Age is derivative — perhaps self consciously so — and its synth pop tunes never reach far beyond the band’s comfort zone.
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Amnplify
Straight off the bat, Little Dark Age is the best album MGMT have produced since their debut album, Oracular Spectacular.
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The Jakarta Post
There will always be that push and pull between the band’s pop and experimental sides. While MGMT might not always feel comfortable with catchy electro pop, it suits the band very well — for now.
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Brooklyn Vegan
Little Dark Age is just the right kind of album to keep the rediscovered excitement for MGMT going.
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K State Collegian
Overall, this album wasn’t the most spectacular, but there were a few good songs, and I’m still excited to see what MGMT does in the future.
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Riot Magazine
MGMT have finally come to terms with the notion of being a crowd-pleasing pop act, and have learnt how to fuse this burden with their unmistakable production and writing style.
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UCSD Guardian
MGMT finally settle into its niche between mainstream pop and indie psych rock.
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Clash Music
A vital return to form that finds the balance between pop and art.
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MCR Live
It’s bounding round our ears – it might not be an outrightly mainstream album, but it’s certainly a grower and a clever and welcome return for duo bringing the 80s back in 2018.
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The Hoya
“Little Dark Age” provides some hope that the band is finally emerging from its indie puberty into a long-overdue musical maturity.
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Young Post
The duo’s latest musical offering might be their best album yet – and that’s saying something.
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The Nevada Sage Brush
It stands as MGMT’s strongest effort front-to-back and capitalizes on the potential they have flirted with for the past decade.
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Soundblab
It's good, very good, and I enjoy large swaths of it.
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The News Journal
MGMT's 'Little Dark Age' is off-kilter, challenging.
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Sputnik Music
Not too bad for a band that only five years ago insisted they couldn’t write pop songs.
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Slant Magazine
For better or worse, Little Dark Age is an album for its time: moody, backward-looking, a little depressed.
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The Young Folks
Where it used to be either a disappointment or a chore to get through a new MGMT project, this one feels like a tease for something great in the future.
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Badger Herald
Little Dark Age is the amalgamation of everything MGMT has released before it, and it shows.
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Riff Magazine
Little Dark Age reimagines MGMT at its most moody and best.
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All Music
They sound like a band treading water, desperately looking for their place in the modern pop landscape and never deciding whether to go pop or stay totally weird. This indecision leaves them stuck in the middle of the road, which isn't a very interesting place to be.
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WMGU Radio
Overall Little Dark Age shines immensely. It’s a great introductory to the band for new listeners, as well as those who enjoyed the pop appeal of Oracular Spectacular and the experimentation of Congratulations.
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Just Musically Speaking
If one wants the good old MGMT the only way to listen to them is picking up the 07’ album.
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The Musical Hype
Alternative duo MGMT, comprised of Andrew Vanwyngarden and Ben Goldwasser, returns with a thrilling new studio album, ‘Little Dark Age.’
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Loud and Quiet
MGMT don’t feel as electric as they once did, but even after a few dissident years, their sense of hope is no less diminished.
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Music Connection
Despite periodic dips, their steady onslaught of intricately meshed sonic bits and bobs sparks persistent rapture.
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XS Noize
They have returned to form once again displaying their knack for fantastic musical hooks and more focused lyrics.
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Varsity
Psychedelic rock stars, MGMT are back with an exciting new release, “a climax of their musical exploration and experimentation”.
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Cryptic Rock
VanWyngarden and Goldwasser’s short vacation proved to be really beneficial to their band, as the musical direction that they decided to take and tVanWyngarden and Goldwasser’s short vacation proved to be really beneficial to their band, as the musical direction that they decided to take and the sonic palette that they chose to use for their new album has resulted in the songs’ assuming individual personalities of their own, making each of them unique and memorable and destined to be future classics and gems.
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ACRN
It’s consistent, pulls from other styles without being too overwhelming and delivers the sort of feeling that MGMT should have been producing all along.
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Boston Globe
It’s a narrative admirably out of step with the aspirational nature of modern music culture, but at times it’s felt like MGMT was overdoing it, smothering natural melodic gifts in self-consciously “difficult” psychedelic affectations as if afraid they might accidentally write a catchy pop song again.
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Diandra Reviews It All
MGMT’s fourth album veils serious fears beneath stylish pop. One again the electro duo show, you can dance through any emotional mess.
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Coog Radio
Little Dark Age is a cohesive blend of experimental synth-pop and psychedelia that has displayed MGMT’s evolving sound impeccably.
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The Wolfpack
“Little Dark Age” is a great MGMT album and I encourage any fans of the band or the genre to listen to it.
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Daily Free Press
‘Little Dark Age’ predictable but still enjoyable.
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The Edge
With Little Dark Age, it’s a return to the catchy melodic writing and retro-’80s instrumentation – but has dark undertones which makes for a pleasantly eerie and enjoyable listen.
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The Sentry
Little Dark Age, their fourth album, still has their signature undercurrent of darkness, but these songs are revitalized by the duo’s ability to write ear-grabbing hooks.
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Exepose
Little Dark Age’s USP (ironically like many of the best albums of the last two years) is just how the individual is just supposed to come to terms with some of the more peculiar machinations of the world we live in. And they pull it off with plenty aplomb.
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Too Many Blogs
It is evident that they are not concerned with what other people think of them or with being on the charts, otherwise they’d be writing pop hits, which we all know they’re perfectly capable of.
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Express & Star
The second half of this record may want to be ignored after a couple of plays.
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Totally Dublin
Featuring appearances from Ariel Pink and Connan Mockasin and a returning David Friedman (this is his third time working with the duo) there’s a fine team contributing to the boundless energy zapping throughout.
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The Ithacan
Psychedelic pop album has presence and permanence.
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The Courier Online
The album is relaxed but somehow altogether challenging.
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Soundazed
Overall, Little Dark Age is a strong comeback album for a band that alienated most of their fans during what should have been their most critical career years.
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The Denisonian
“Little Dark Age” makes the band’s comeback complete through stellar songwriting, groovy basslines, danceable beats, spacey instrumentation that is loaded with detail, and the incorporation of the band’s classic whimsical charm.
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Rockhaq
Many have touted Little Dark Age as a return to MGMT’s pop roots…The wild ideas they’ve experimented with since are still present. The duo have just used them in smarter, more accessible ways, resulting in an album as catchy as it is bonkers.
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The Statesman
“Little Dark Age” is not MGMT’s magnum opus, but the equal parts dark and cheeky 10-track album is enough to lure lost fans back.
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The Red & Black
MGMT returns from hiatus with lovely, dark album.
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KTSW Radio
Little Dark Age is MGMT’s unsurpassed album.
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Spectrum Culture
They’ve succeeded, sort of.
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The Melomaniacs
Little Dark Age marks MGMT’s proper return to a more pop-centric sound, albeit with a cheesy, pseudo-satirical aftertaste.
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Sungenre Review
There is the sense that they had to go through all that confusion to arrive at this album. And after all those years, an album like this feels earned.
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Gigwise
A literate electro-pop masterclass from the brainy Connecticut duo.
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The Yale Herald
MGMT displays a heightened awareness of their social context as they delve even further into the realm of the unexpected.
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The National Student
MGMT have overseen a blazing renaissance; transcending the mire of pessimism, their morbid humour serves as a subtext beneath dense, technicoloured compositions.
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The Snapper
So far, “Little Dark Age” has received a rating of four out of five stars in the first few days of being released. This album definitely shows aspects of how the band has changed and developed since their last release in 2013.
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KUMD Radio
The 10-track album contains some of the best music from this notorious duo who are returning after a 5-year hiatus.
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We Plug Good Music
This oddly dated feel, coupled with the forward-looking lyrical focus gives Little Dark Age a post-apocalyptic atmosphere well-matched to its title. Maybe this is the new cutting edge. Maybe it isn’t. But it’s lightyears more listenable than 2013’s release, so I’m satisfied.
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Medium
Little Dark Age shines as one of 2018’s best to date.
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Financial Times
The duo’s latest tries to recapture the zest of their debut with zany misanthropy, synth drones and washed-out vocals.
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The Needle Drop
NY pop duo MGMT executes a fantastic return to form with the sounds of synth pop on Little Dark Age.
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Radio UTD
Little Dark Age is MGMT's most mature project to date, sonically and lyrically. It's grounded in reality, and although they are known for their danceable tracks, they admit that not even they can escape the effects of today's harsh political climate.
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SoundStage! Access
Little Dark Age may be a bid for a bigger audience for MGMT, but either way, it’s well crafted, musically and lyrically witty, and highly enjoyable.
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La Vista
MGMT’s latest album “Little Dark Age” lacks organization.
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Salute Mag
While there is no denying that MGMT is going through an experimental phase, toying with their overall sound, the result is something that really plays to people’s nostalgic tendencies.
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WZND Radio
I love the aesthetic and experimental sounds they use, it is different and really shows their artistic abilities as musicians. I love the deep and haunting bass lines that add a gothic foundation to every song off the album.
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Pop Goes The Weasel
‘Little Dark Age’ won’t create the same buzz or have the same influence, but it’s a giddy and life affirming return from a band who many assumed had lost their inner sparkle and ambition.
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FLOOD Magazine
MGMT’s fourth LP Little Dark Age marks a return to the concise synth pop of Oracular Spectacular after their intermittent phases of indulgent psych-rock.
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Edinboro Now
“Little Dark Age” is a technically fine piece of music from one of the most creative bands this side of the millennium, but it serves more as a proof of concept for where the band wants to go in the future, not as a solid album.
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Sound Opinions
On paper, MGMT seems like a band Jim would love, but in reality, he's not the slightest bit smitten. He calls them“smug, derivative and pretentious”and says he would trash this album a million times over.
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Guestlist
Little Dark Age is an understatedly clever creation, looking at many elements of past and present culture, whilst also giving us more brilliantly weird and catchy music that the MGMT are so good at making.
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Renowned for Sound
Little Dark Age needs your time and effort paid to it in order for it to be truly appreciated as a body of work. It’s ideal to put on when the only remedy to the world is to zone out for a brief period. Let MGMT be your audio muscle relaxant as you float through the eternity of space.
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The Student Playlist
It’s not quite the return to the days of ‘Kids’ and ‘Time To Pretend’, but MGMT’s fourth album ‘Little Dark Age’ is certainly their most focussed and pop-orientated in the decade since those glory days.
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Exposed Magazine
For patient plastic pop people 8/10. For everyone else, an intermittently annoying 6/10.
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Sacred Exile
Oozing with originality and their distinct psychedelic synth-pop hooks, Little Dark Age edges MGMT closer to effectively balancing creativity and talent with needless excess and frills.
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Under the Radar Mag
Little Dark Age is a welcome return of MGMT's pop instincts, but it rarely shies away from the duo's love of adventurous psychedelia, either. It's perhaps the best indie-rock album of the year so far.
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NZ Herald
MGMT may have lost touch over their last two albums, but Little Dark Age opens up a promising new door.
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Metro Weekly
Little Dark Age is a surprising and welcome change of pace for MGMT.
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Off License Magazine
MGMT are one of the most engaging pop bands of the last decade… No, that’s not followed by, ‘Discuss.’ It’s a big, fat, immutable statement.
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KJHK Radio
Little Dark Age’s mix of radio-friendly hits and experimental tracks serve as a perfect balance for those wanting to jump into the band’s discography. If you’re coming to this album after knowing one of their three hits, you’ll find most of these tracks comfortable and highly enjoyable.
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Michigan Daily
MGMT refines amoebic sound with more mature ‘Little Dark Age’.
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Earbuddy
No need to pretend, this MGMT record is solid as they come.
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The Crow's Nest
MGMT’s “Little Dark Age” is trapped in history.
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Immortal Reviews
MGMT get weird on Little Dark Age, delivering thought-provoking songs that in their oddity have lots of depth, but at times perhaps a bit too much to keep you fully invested.
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Popdust
This album, like many MGMT projects, has moments of pop-psych bliss, and that's not sarcasm. For what it's worth, the boys are no longer trying to outwit alternative rock as a genre, while winking at the legends that came before them.
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The Mancunion
MGMT are fully aware that they haven’t been able to recreate their success of their debut album and while we can safely say this LP won’t bring them the same recognition, it has the ability to influence people’s thinking.
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University Observer
A fresh, forward sound from a band you might have forgotten about, and you’ll be sure to have a nice little boogie.
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Mariner Media
MGMT's newest album is eclectic and fun.
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The Aquarian
Little Dark Age is deliciously pop, surprisingly morbid, rambunctious, clever, and, of course, psychedelic.
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The VLM
Little Dark Age isn’t quite the psychedelic bumper that Oracular Spectacular was, but times have changed. The album is a fresh and modern leap in the right direction with radio-friendly hits too.
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KUPS Radio
Little Dark Age is a seamless, toned down comeback for MGMT.
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KUPS Radio
MGMT’s new album Little Dark Age takes them on a path that strays away from what attracted me to them in the first place. This is not to say it's without its high points.
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Madison Dodger Online
The bass on this song is nearly impeccable in all the tracks where it is towards the front of the sound, particularly on the title track and “TSLAMP”. The synth work in all the tracks is on the same level of the bass, if not better. The production quality is stellar, close in quality to other synth based groups like Tame Impala.
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La Voz News
“Little Dark Age” is a fantastic album, with just enough variety to still be engaging without forgetting its synth pop aesthetic. If you want a nostalgic, darkly humorous album to listen to, MGMT’s latest triumph is for you.
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WRBB Radio
MGMT have exquisitely crafted a few songs that caution the listener about the modern day and age but fail to be completely cohesive. With one too many songs that either don’t fit or are complete trash, what could have been an impeccable EP is ultimately a disjointed fourth album.
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Jamie Cameron
Little Dark Age is a successful and typically MGMT take on 80s pop (although not devoid of filler.)
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The Cavalier Daily
MGMT’s fourth album provides a nostalgic yet exciting listening experience.
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Daily Nebraskan
Now veterans of the industry, MGMT knows what its about and has delivered once again an album that sounds, well, like MGMT.
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QRO Magazine
Little Dark Age isn’t Oracular Spectacular II, but it shouldn’t be. It is a band that has successfully balanced catchy and weird doing so again, in their own way.
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The Heights
On the 10-track album, MGMT cements its eternal status as a pop powerhouse with unique flare and charisma.
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The Red Ledger
This off-kilter and oddly addicting entry to MGMT’s discography is sure to please MGMT fans of all stripes.
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News OK
Perfect for an album in 2018, VanWyngarden explores tech addiction.
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Inhailer
It seems MGMT have finally found their sound again.
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The Wee Review
American duo return to pop delights but it’s not as spectacular.
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The Panoptic
The fourth studio outing from indie-psych's best-known stalwarts is clearly a compromise between critical approval and personal creative vision, but walking the thin red line between both fields has never sounded better.
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Giglist
A return to golden era MGMT with Little Dark Age.
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Thomas Bleach
The strongest track on this collection is the lead single and title track “Little Dark Age” which is a completely strange yet captivating song which perfects the sound they were going towards. I just wish the rest of the album was as strong at this one.
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Irish News
If you like alternative rock and heartfelt lyrics but without a saccharine delivery then this could be a record worth checking out.
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The Quad
In the little dark age that the world currently faces, MGMT provide a forward and backward-thinking escape into synth pop madness.
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DIY Mag
MGMT still manage to make it fun, toeing the line between danceable and moody. It’s a sure sign that this will be far from a dark age for the pair.
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This Song Is Sick
Little Dark Age is more likely to have your head bobbing than to have you pondering on what it all means. It’s danceable albeit weird, introspective while not taking itself too seriously, and it’s something that only MGMT could pull off.
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