MGMT have revealed the new "Sonic-the-Hedgehog-surfs-on-acid" artwork for their forthcoming second album, Congratulations. It's a doozy.



Boing Boing spoke to the artist responsible for the cover, Anthony Ausgang. Ausgang is a proponent of the "lowbrow" art genre, which takes it's frame of reference from pop culture and counterculture imagery. According tothe piece, the band were fans of his work and invited Ausgang to hang at their Malibu recording studio:

I met Andrew and Ben from MGMT through the experimental musician Sonic Boom of Spacemen 3 and Spectrum, for whom I had done album cover art in the past. MGMT was recording Congratulations at a mansion in Malibu so I went there a couple of times to hang out and watch the process unfold. Not being a musician I was occasionally left to my own devices so I would sit around and draw on pieces of paper then leave them there when I went home. I got along well with the band and gave them copies of my book, Vacation From Reality. Later, Josh Cheuse, the art director from Sony, contacted me once the recording was finished. The most important thing was that MGMT wanted the "look" of my style of painting and gave me only a few points that I had to hit. Naturally the process took some time but they were always cool with the criticisms. A lot of people who commission a painting only know what they don't want; fortunately MGMT knew what they wanted and let me do it my way.

As previously reported, in an interview with US mag Entertainment Weekly, singer Andrew VanWyngarden says the new album is 'going to be a big change':

For people that just know our singles, it’s going to be a big change. For people who get into some of the other tracks on the first album that were more psychedelic and classic-rock-influenced, they’ll be happy. It’s a pretty natural progression. But a lot of people think of us as an electro duo, and it’s not like that at all. It’s really catchy and really honest and heartfelt in a good way. We dropped some of the irony that you can find in our earlier songs."

Congratulations is out April 13th.