Review
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Mosquito

Part of me has waited so long to review the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s fourth album, Mosquito because I really don’t want to pan the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. In fact, I’d like to pretend Mosquito didn’t happen after three knock out albums that were filled with passion, rock and roll and intensity - Fever to Tell (2003), Show Your Bones (2006) and It’s Blitz! (2009). Mosquito has those three characteristics in some instances, (“Sacrilege” and “Despair”) but hardly at all. 
It’s weird to me that this album doesn’t sound more passionate and the lyrics more idealistic because it’s not like they were burnt out with the success of It’s Blitz! They took their time and Mosquito took four years after It’s Blitz! to release. The album sounds like they weren’t sure what direction they were going in - maybe that was the problem. This exemplifies in “Mosquito,” the title track, “Subway” and “These Paths”. Some parts of the songs are hard, Fever to Tell - “Date with the Night” rock and then the next verse, it’s “Maps” and it's “Dragon Queen” (from It’s Blitz!). I don’t dislike those two songs but they give you a different feeling. A verse of a song that’s raw and loud could work with another verse that’s mellow and acoustic but it doesn’t work with these songs. Perhaps they were experimenting but it just turns into a confused, three minute jumble.
I am giving this album some benefit of the doubt in my rating since I really liked “Sacrilege”. In fact, I was excited when I heard this for the first time because it seemed very much like it could be a song on Show Your Bones - the song is a middle ground between their experimental dance vibe on It’s Blitz! and the gritty rock and roll sound that was on Fever to Tell - much like the songs on Show Your Bones. I was anticipating this album because they had such a strong first single, but unfortunately, it’s one of those albums where the single is good, the rest of the songs are not.