Hawnay Troof

Hawnay Troof

With Islands of Ayle, XBXRX frontman Vice Cooler has transformed his alter ego Hawnay Troof from a danceable gag project into a legitimate artistic enterprise. This isn't to say Islands is what one would call "serious." Cooler's no less obsessed with silliness and sex than ever, but here he's turned his songs from one-note appropriations into attention-deficient orgies of irony, jamming together samples and 8-bit sound effects, the disc approximates a three-stage Top 40 rap concert at a circus inside a video game. His hooks cut the mustard, as well: Cue up the deliriously annoying schoolyard-taunt chorus of "Connection" or the gleeful, rapid-fire dirty chant of "Bizarre Triangle." To describe Hawnay Troof as frivolous is a tautology; to say Cooler has the flow God gave an earth-friendly toilet is only mildly ungenerous. Neither is relevant to this joyfully impudent album. (3pm, Stage 4.)