Late Night Tales: MGMT [+CD]

As a series, Late Night Tales is an interesting exercise. Asking musicians to make late-night mixes from their own collections, the series finds artists ranging from Jamiroquai to the Flaming Lips putting together their own mixtapes of quintessential after-hours jams, but on the MGMT installment, the series really knocks it out of the park. Featuring songs by artists like Television Personalities, Spacemen 3, and Suicide, the collection succeeds on a couple of levels, existing not only as a solid set of spacy, nocturnal songs, but also as a Rosetta Stone for MGMT's own influences. Listening to the album almost feels like putting together a puzzle, with the finished product being their eclectic sophomore effort, Congratulations. And as if a collection of some of the moodiest, reverb-soaked post-punk to ever walk the earth wasn't enough, the album also features MGMT performing a cover of Bauhaus' "All We Ever Wanted Was Everything," which manages to slot in nicely with the rest of the tracks here. Whether you're coming for the MGMT track and staying for the history lesson, or coming for the track list and discovering MGMT, this entry into the Late Night Tales canon is a solid winner. ~ Gregory Heaney