A not-so-odd couple when you think about it.
Earlier this year, the duo who go by the moniker of Gnarls Barkley (who many people still think is a person) released their sophomore effort, ‘The Odd Couple’ and oddly enough, I haven’t heard much of it anywhere.
In 2006, DJ Danger Mouse, was most famous for the ‘Grey Album’, a mash-up of The Beatles’ White Album and Metallica’s Black album, (imagine that Pro-tools session 
)
But for me, his best work ever was producing the (Damon Albarn of Blur, fronted) Gorillaz album ‘Demon Days’ which is in my top five best ever albums.
Cee-Lo wasn’t really that famous. He was part of a group called Goodie Mob and then release a couple of solo albums.
But when these two came together to produce their first album ‘St. Elsewhere’ under the arbitrarily made up name ‘Gnarls Barkley’, people went nuts. The first single from the album, ‘Crazy’ was given such heavy airplay on television and radio that most people had it coming out of their behinds. Gnalrs performed ‘Crazy’ live, on Conan O’Brien and it topped charts on both sides of the pond and the album went Platinum.
My favourite track from that album was ‘Online’ which shows off Danger Mouse’s skill as a producer as well as Cee-Lo’s powerful voice to best effect with buttery smooth, catchy loops overlaid with Cee-Lo sounding gravelly and slightly unhinged. Sadly, I cant find it anywhere on the internet so you will just have preview it on itunes here.
So, back to their second album, I think it is actually much better than St. Elsewhere. It is better produced, the songs are darker and broodier, the duo seem to have found a sound that suits them and the album is definitely worth listening to in its entirety, something that couldn’t be said about ‘St.Elsewhere.’
So why isn’t this album as successful as the previous one? Is it just because there isn’t that one catchy single on it that just blows up? Thats just sad.