These days, it can sort of feel like schizophrenic, unlistenable remixes of “All Star,” “One Week,” “Smooth,” and so on have always been with us, having emerged from the primal swamp of Soundcloud and gone on to take over the internet. But really, we mostly have the artist and musician Neil Cicerga to thank for the phenomenon, which was born right around the time he released his Smash Mouth-centric mashup album Mouth Sounds in 2014. Cicierega, a 30-year-old from Boston, has been making viral internet art since back in the days of Crazy Frog and Peanut Butter Jelly Time–his animation Hyakugojyuuichi earned him a writeup in Salon in 2001, when he was only 14.
Today, Cicierega returns with Mouth Moods. As a remixer, he’s halfway between John Oswald and Girl Talk, driven by his absurdist sense of humor and the free-for-all possibilities of sampling, but he reins in the anarchy to the point that you can almost imagine dancing to it. For instance, Mouth Moods begins with a loop of the intro to Nine Days’ cheeseball 2000 hit “Absolutely (Story of a Girl)” (you definitely know it, even if you don’t think you do), and reaches an early climax when AC/DC’s Brian Johnson grunts “Back In Black” against the piano riff from Vanessa Carlton’s “1000 Miles.” If that sounds like the kind of thing that would bring you pleasure, as opposed to drive you out of your mind, you can listen below.
