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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.

At Mount Zoomer
by Wolf Parade


9.2

based on 28 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 42 votes
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Rate this album

Apologies To The Queen Mary

Wolf Parade @ Sub Pop

The Montreal quartet recorded its sophomore album at Arcade Fire's church studio.

LABEL:	Sub Pop
RELEASE DATE:	17 June 2008
DISCS:	1 disc
GENRE(S):	Rock, Indie

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

The Phoenix

At Mount Zoomer will give you those same goosebumps you felt when you heard the band’s debut.

All Music Guide

All in all, At Mount Zoomer is a remarkable achievement, and another soon-to-be classic from Wolf Parade.

Hartford Courant

Although "Queen Mary" was a strong showing, At Mount Zoomer--named for the band's recording space--is an instant classic, distancing itself from indie rock's skin-deep quirks on the way to something grander and more enduring.

cokemachineglow

At Mount Zoomer is a tremendous success.

Under The Radar

Rather than stick to two sides of the coin, this new material satisfyingly splinters in myriad directions. [Summer 2008]

Blender

Arcade Fire never babbled about “horse-shaped fire/Draggin’ stereo wire.” These guys make it seem like an Olympic sport.

NOW Magazine

Thankfully, At Mount Zoomer is a formidable collection of catchy indie art-rock that won’t disappoint fans of their acclaimed debut.

Q Magazine

At Mount Zoomer finds them making a giant leap forward, its surfeit of innovation defying easy categorisation. [Aug 2008, p.145]

Billboard

The time between now and its 2005 Sub Pop debut, "Apologies to the Queen Mary," allowed the group to more fully develop its sound. At Mount Zoomer expands upon the bits-and-pieces pop approach of its debut into a solid set of rock songs.

Tiny Mix Tapes

It’s breathtaking, it’s assured, it’s a perfect finale, it LIVES UP TO THE HYPE.

Boston Globe

Upping the studio gloss, turning the amps up--way up--and reining in their more twee impulses, the Montreal bloggers' heroes unleash their inner beast, growing by taking a page out of their colleagues' playbooks.

Urb

At Mount Zoomer will get hipsters dancing around once again, but I think the respect and hype is most definitely due to Wolf Parade this time.

Delusions of Adequacy

Sure, you can kind of tell--except for the finale--they each sing four songs and their styles are unmistakable; however, they result in one tight, unified, startling beast of an album--it’s downright astonishing.

Slant Magazine

With At Mount Zoomer, Wolf Parade has quite easily surpassed the greatness that was their debut, and have very quietly made one of the better albums of 2008.

Paste Magazine

Like debut "Apologies to the Queen Mary," the band’s sophomore LP is as shaggy and sharp as the its lupine muse: Fierce, but Wolf Parade is too cagey to sacrifice discipline for ferocity; they attack with tact.

Pitchfork

At Mount Zoomer is fractured and spastic, and at times, the band's ambition eclipses its strengths. Still, there's something about Wolf Parade's fragility that's profoundly relatable, and the sense that the entire operation could fall apart at any second--that we're all tottering on the brink of total dissolution--is as thrilling as it terrifying.

Entertainment Weekly

While Zoomer is a perfectly decent collection of piano-riddled pomp and sprawling raucous songcraft, it suffers somewhat from the Indie Rock Slumpy Sophomore Syndrome. [20 June 2008, p.67]

Spin

It's an irresisitible, exhilarating mix that sounds like no band but Wolf Parade.

PopMatters

While Mount Zoomer is not likely to stand as Wolf Parade’s definitive statement, it does represent a bold step in a new direction and gives us a good idea as to where the band is headed: anywhere but the mainstream.

Rolling Stone

It's largely indecipherable, totally animalistic and frequently breathtaking.

Drowned In Sound

Regardless of the songwriter, the lyrics overlap from track to track, and no doubt there will be a few erudite folks campaigning to weave a singular poetic storyline for our edification. Whether this is by design, or simply the product of the fanciful imaginations of Wolf Parade fans, the casual listener is rewarded with a batch of songs that works best when taken from a beginning-middle-end perspective.

No Ripcord

With a tidy nine tracks, At Mount Zoomer seems like it would be trimmed of any unnecessary filler, but somewhere in the second half things begin to wilt with only shades of interesting ideas.

Prefix Magazine

There’s not much here that will surprise longtime fans of Krug and Boeckner’s work, although they have slowly turned the wheel and moved the Wolf Parade sound on from "Apologies to the Queen Mary."

The New York Times

The two men’s reedy voices come across as more harried than heroic. And often the keyboard bits are linked into structures that are neat yet crowded; just when one riff grows familiar and hummable, an eager new one shows up to displace it. It’s invigorating during a song, but a little exhausting over the length of an album.

Lost At Sea

At Mount Zoomer is interesting and focused, but safe.

The Onion (A.V. Club)

While At Mount Zoomer is occasionally faceless, at least it's a good faceless. There isn't a bad song here, just few great ones.

Uncut

Lyrically, there's little to cling onto, but it's not inconceivable a song like 'Soldier's Grin' could see them follow labelmates The Shins into indie ubiquity. [Sep 2008, p.115]

The Guardian

If you have an itch you can never scratch for whoopingly hollered songs about radio waves being "like snow", then Spencer Krug and Dan Boeckner's band will be like a welcome ice cube on a mosquito bite. If you don't, they will become the mosquito.

The average user rating for this album is 9.2 (out of 10) based on 42 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Mark S. gave it a9:
Who would have thought that being a 48-year-old post-punk newcomer as of the beginning of this scary decade as far as I can remember would eventually yield a gem that is "At Mount Zoomer," and I guess I need to revisit the Bowie catalogue, or just appreciate the fact that he seems to be one of the important Gods in my religion.

Nick R gave it a9:
Don't kill me for saying this, but Mount Zoomer does, in fact, reach the heights of Apologies. The taut pop-song structure on their first album contained the perhaps more cohesive songwriting -- here it runs free, wilder and more wolfish. It's the energy and life, though, behind all the histrionics which makes Kissing the Beehive the album's climax as opposed to a throwaway bit of self-indulgence.

Anonymous gave it a10:
Its so hard to follow apologies to the queen mary. however, wolf parade does with another soon to be classic. kissing the beehive is all 11 minutes.

Eddy T. gave it a9:
Apologies is still the better album- there's no equivalent on Mount Zoomer to Shine a Light or I'll Believe in Anything, but damn, At Mount Zoomer is still impressive, especially tracks like California Dreamer, An Animal in Your Case and the sprawling and surprising epic that is Kissing the Beehive.

Marc Z. gave it a9:
They've developed their style a bit more on the second LP. I loved the second half of the first album, and At Mount Zoomer is full of songs that remind me of it.

Nick F. gave it a10:
Wow This band can't get any better. They are already at their peak with their second, or maybe not, maybe it gets even better. All I can say is wow

Colin G. gave it a10:
One of, if not the best, album of the year. There are truly inspired hooks in each song and a real sense that this band put a lot of effort, songwriting and production, into this release. I have a particular soft spot for concept albums, as I think it shows a real greatness to write consistently good songs about related topics and throw them onto an album that actually works. This one works very well. It's amazing to me that they've found such a wonderful balance with their own instrumentation. The high piano lines and jangly guitars from their previous album stand here unobtrusive and completely relevant, often complimenting one another in a way that makes you not think about them too much, which is, in my opinion, the way it should be. My only issue with it is the Bowie conjuring on "An Animal in Your Care" (not that I dislike Bowie, but it's an obvious rip-off), but that is quickly overshadowed by the fabulous second-half of that song. A++!

At Mount Zoomer by Wolf Parade

At Mount Zoomer
by Wolf Parade