The winding path to Mac DeMarco’s ‘Five Easy Hot Dogs’

“Five Easy Hot Dogs captures the essence of DeMarco—the person and the musician. The relaxed and somewhat bittersweet record falls between stories of love and youth that characterize his earlier works, like 2, and the melancholy melodies of This Old Dog. The new record relies solely on sound—no lyrics—a decision made by the artist to differentiate his work, and to propose something new. Five Easy Hot Dogs debuts a DeMarco without complacency; he invites the range offered in ambiguity—in storytelling unrestricted by the specificities of language.”