Try this for an experiment. Save this MP3 with a random string of letters as a filename. Wipe the ID3 tags too. Then file the MP3 away for a week or two, forget you read this or downloaded it. Then listen to it. What does it sound like?

Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

Eerie, isn’t it? If you said “the guy from Apples in Stereo doing sunshine doo-wop,” congratulations, you win the “get out of my head please” award for creeping me out. But more importantly, you get an idea of just how far Junior Senior can stretch their raison d’etre. You remember Junior Senior, yes? If not, here’s a reminder:
But that disco synth oddity bears little resemblance to the likes of “No No No’s,” one of the songs on the tail end of 2005’s Hey Hey My My Yo Yo, recently released for the first time in North America with an extra EP of recent material as a sort of apology from the Danish duo for failing to get their act together in a reasonable amount of time.

So what? Plenty of bands take a sharp left turn on their second release, you might say. But chances are you didn’t suspect Junior Senior had it in them to even put out a second album; as great as it was, D-D-Don’t Stop the Beat was kind of a two-trick pony—disco madness raveup and garage rock dance party. But more than that was the band’s attitude, so carefree and happy-go-lucky that it didn’t quite seem possible for there to be a second album, period—who on earth is that happy long enough to make two albums made out of balloon-grade helium and Prozac?

But not only did Junior Senior manage the trick of putting out an album with just as much giddiness as the first (and if you want evidence, I need only point you to “We R the Handclaps”), they even managed to con the members of Le Tigre into putting out the best album they never made. It’s worth the purchase price just to hear Kathleen Hanna as the new girl in town, hopin’ for a little romance on “Dance, Chance, Romance.” Not even “Deceptacon” was ever this fun. Note to Le Tigre: you should try playing against type more often.

As for Junior Senior, the Say Hello, Wave Goodbye EP that accompanies the North American release of the album has the band edging into 80s retro territory, with more artificial synths and fake cowbells in the mix. It’s not bad, but coming off the highs of Hey Hey My My Yo Yo the new songs sound a bit minor league. But maybe that’s just a ploy by Messrs. Junior and Senior to lull us back into our false sense of knowing superiority. Surely they can’t have another album like the first two waiting in the wings?

Can they?