Considering it took over four years for Frog to come up with 2023’s Grog, the arrival of 1000 Variations on the Same Song, their sixth album, is a premature gift. Of course, their unusually speedy return comes with a catch—as the LP title suggests—that reads like a confession. Mere months ago, singer-guitarist Daniel Bateman and his brother, drummer Steve Bateman, were churning out indie folk and alt-country demos with the same results each time, as if using a weird little cookie cutter that only belonged to them. Confined within this trap of his own making, Daniel Bateman decided to stop trying to break free from his songwriting hallmarks. Instead, he broke out a box of toppings and figured out how to spruce them up.
1000 Variations on the Same Song isn’t as literal as the title implies; nearly all 11 tracks are different from one another in structure and content. It’s the revision process that challenged Bateman. Articulating his denial and acceptance, he quotes from The Wire in album opener “Stillwell”: “You want it to be one way, man.” Is that really so bad? The brain tries to convince you that breaking habits is easy. The self-help section of your local bookstore, however, would like a word. In the song, Bateman dresses up an alcoholic in the language of a salesman—both stuck in cycles, albeit one for relief and the other for profit—to drive home the point over half-hearted piano. “I’m a pro, this ain’t a hobby,” he sings, nodding to the unspoken course of action for both his protagonists and himself: So make it work.
Bateman kept Mozart, Kodak Black, and Prince spinning while writing, but admits the album “doesn’t really sound like any of those”—except when it does. His unbelievably high-pitched falsetto does the heavy lifting in “JUST USE YR HIPS VAR. VI,” turning chunky piano chords into a funk-pop groove just a few steps removed from the 1986 classic “Kiss.” The simple harmonies and giddy tempo shifts in a song like “DOOMSCROLLING VAR. II” draw a line back to classical convention. Frog hold true to their key ingredients, like the brotherly vocal harmonies adding cheer to “DID SANTA COME VAR. IX” and the hiccupping drum pattern that brings momentum to the stripped-down “BLAMING IT ALL ON THE LIFESTYLE VAR. V.” Shortly after that, Frog revive the banjo for “MIXTAPE LINER NOTES VAR. VII,” and the song blooms with the layered depth of a band twice their size, as if pulling it off with help from an unofficial spokesperson.
With similar songwriting come a few gems that sound like they were plucked from elsewhere in Frog’s discography, much to fans’ delight. The driving Americana spirit and heartfelt vocals of closer “ARTHUR MCBRIDE VAR. X” would fit right in on Count Bateman. On “TOP OF THE POPS VAR. I,” Frog opt for multi-tracked electric guitar, a staple of their catalog but a surprisingly infrequent feature of 1000 Variations. “You never know where this will go,” Bateman sings, as if explaining the acoustic, lo-fi direction of the whole album.
Frog confront a songwriting exercise in public that some artists scrap in private, struggling to admit a truth all composers must face: Not everything we create is unique. Though 1000 Variations’ songs fall under the same umbrella, occasionally merging from one to the next like a single continuous piece, listeners can feel the grooves of alternate textures and spot thin layers tucked in the background. If they were less comfortable divulging secrets, Frog could have whipped up bootleg Where’s Waldo artwork to get the point across. Instead, the brothers stand proudly outside in the photo on the album cover, grinning widely, arms slung around each other’s shoulders with nobody else around. There’s no hiding their faults or attempting to blend in. As usual, the charm of Frog and their music is in how plainly they lay themselves bare.
