Pitchfork

OK, now the Wire comparisons make a little more sense. A once mad-paced acoustic number becomes more detached, economical electro, starting from scratch but keeping the structure. The original rhythm stays, but a few heavily-compressed chords replace the original's hokey strum. A horror-show keyboard hovers like a dentist's drill in the background, and a few terse octaves play hokey-pokey in the bridge-- all minimal additions made essential from the sparseness of the new arrangement. All that would save a better song, but "Cowbell" is by far my least favorite of TNT's, a high-energy go-nowhere jam with none of the inscrutable references or patchwork charm of the rest of their debut. The remix is even more energy, and better ideas, headed to the same place.