Yeah Yeah Yeahs

With Yeah Yeah Yeahs' last album, 2009's It's Blitz, the NYC trio threatened to abandon everything we've come to know and love about them. A slick stab at mainstream acceptance, with its synth-laden disco melodies, It's Blitz wasn't a failure by any means, just a slightly unnatural step away from their earlier works, which were teeming with raw, dishevelled punk anthems cutting your ears with sharp riffs and Karen O's unearthly growls. Thankfully, their latest, Mosquito, is a return of sorts to their grungy roots. In recent interviews, lead singer O has admitted to not trying anymore in order to extract something more natural and less forced, and this album's smorgasbord of sounds is the successful result of that. From a gospel choir epiphany and subway noises to rapper Kool Keith's guest verse and ex-LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy producing said Kool Keith track, Mosquito takes Yeah Yeah Yeahs' finest moments to new extents. Opening track and single "Sacrilege" is the comeback anthem we've been waiting for since Fever to Tell, with the aforementioned gospel choir waving in at the end, while "Slave" and "Mosquito" return the spotlight to guitarist Nick Zinner and his razor-sharp riffs, a constant highlight of the band's most memorable hits. Fans confused by the album's cartoonish, Garbage Pail Kids artwork can be assured that there's nothing perplexing in the music — the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are back, better than ever and ready to "suck your blood."