Yoko Ono Collaboration Mashup

Yes, I’m a Witch Too is the latest solo album from Yoko Ono, a strange compilation of collaborations with artists as disparate as Moby, Portugal the Man and Death Cab for Cutie, each track representing her work with a different artist. This format gives the album a very mixtape-like quality, and rather than forming a cohesive statement it feels like a collection of isolated thoughts, the production ranging from club electronic to garage rock. Overall the record draws its main strength from this zany, scatterbrained nature, which keeps it from growing dull and makes its flaws more entertaining than off-putting.

Yoko Ono occupies a strange place in the compositions, hanging between being absolutely vital and utterly superfluous. On one hand, her tangible contributions seem negligible, mostly relegated to adding some strange lyrics and meandering vocals over the top of whatever her collaborator has produced. Additionally, song titles like “Mrs. Lennon” and “No Bed for Beatle John” demonstrate an irksome reliance on linking herself to fame of her husband, seemingly in some continued case for her relevancy. On the other hand, Yoko does a great job of being the glue holding the patchwork together, and as a curveball thrown in the direction of the artists she works with, pushing many of them in interesting and amusing directions, perhaps most notably Death Cab for Cutie’s strange Afrikaa Bambaataa-reminiscent 80’s techno jam, “Forgive Me My Love” and “Warrior Women” the even more bizarre collaboration with tUnE-yArDs featuring Yoko vocal line backed by alarming stabs from a group of backup singers and 808 crash hits throughout. One can also hear Yoko’s voice being given a chopped and screwed effect on “Catman” and fairly straight-forward garage rock tunes like “Approximately Infinite Universe”.

One also has to give credit to her beautiful fedora-core cover art concept, which is genuinely vital to setting the ideal mood for listening to this album. Given an open mind and this seed of humor planted the records meandering path become an enjoyable and entertaining trip.