An underrated album with dinosaurs

Dinosaurchestra is an album released in 2006 by the band Lemon Demon. Lemon Demon is only 1 person (for the most part) and that person’s name is Neil Cicierega. Neil Cicierega has been very popular on the internet for a long time, but a lot of people still don’t know who he is. He created the popular series Potter Puppet Pals, a series of albums called Mouth Sounds, Mouth Silence, Mouth Moods, and Mouth Dreams. He also created the songs “Brodyquest” and “The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny”.

Around a week ago, I decided to listen to Dinosaurchestra. I know it’s an old album, but I had never heard it, and I wanted to review it. I had only heard 1 or 2 songs from it, and I had been wanting to listen to it for a while but I constantly forgot about it. I had already listened to a lot of songs from Lemon Demon/Neil Cicierega; I pretty much listen to his music every day. I didn’t know if it was going to be good because I don’t like a lot of Lemon Demon’s earlier albums, but I was pleasantly surprised. 

The first thing I noticed is that all of the songs have a mix of funny and good-sounding lyrics. All of the lyrics seem to fit the song. The lyrics in the songs sometimes make you wonder how he came up with that idea. Some of the songs sound so good that you don’t pay much attention to the lyrics. For example, something I missed when I first listened to the album was the song “Stuck”. When I listened to that song more carefully I realized that it was about somebody trapped in a song. The way the lyrics fit the song allowed me to not realize this even though he was literally singing “I’m just walking along, stuck in a song, whistling thusly.” and the chorus is “break it off break it off, take me out. Don’t let the melody fake me out.”

This kinda reminds me of the song “Hey Ya” by Outkast, where the song talks about a failing relationship with an upbeat song, but most people don’t realize what the song is really about.

One thing that I also love about this album is the instruments he used. Pretty much all of the songs use either guitars, synths, or piano. Those instruments always sound good together so the fact that a lot of songs use them makes this album feel awesome. Although the melodies are very simple and repetitive in some songs, that just makes them more catchy and the chorus is usually different enough for the song to still be considered nonrepetitive (at least by me). I also like how some songs have short sections with fewer instruments. I wouldn’t exactly call this a bridge because they don’t happen in places where bridges typically are. However, sometimes these parts can happen during the bridge. The songs are so unique that I can’t compare them with anything except for Lemon Demon’s other albums.

The best songs from this album are probably the songs “Dinosaurchestra” (parts 1, 2, and 3), “The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny”, and “Fine”. “Dinosaurchestra” (which is kinda confusing because it has the same name as the album) is pretty much an 8-minute song spread across three parts in the album. It’s about dinosaurs, which is pretty cool, but the song is kinda dark at the end. “The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny” is very epic. The song is a little overwhelming, but it is such a good song. There is a good reason this is one of Lemon Demons’ most well-known songs. “Fine” is definitely my favorite song on this album. The part where he sings “I know (I know) That every bomb has a silver lining” gets stuck in my head a lot for some reason.

Overall, Dinosaurchestra is definitely one of my favorite albums, even if it was released 15 years ago. Everything about this album is great! If you haven’t listened to it before, I suggest you do! The album is on Spotify and on Lemon Demons Bandcamp.

By: Alex Roberts