Scissor Sisters - Ta-Dah (Collectors Edition) (2006)

The second album by New York City's Scissor Sisters, Ta-Dah, brings with it a huge weight of expectations. After all, their debut album slowly rode up the charts in 2004 to become that year's biggest selling album. The good news is that, like their debut, Ta-Dah is packed full of witty, grown-up pop music. Their influences remain the same, including a bit of 1970's disco and glam rock, a bit of classic Fleetwood Mac and a bit of early Elton John (who plays piano on the ultra-catchy album opener "I Don't Feel Like Dancing"). Musically, it's easily as much fun as their debut: "Land of a Thousand Words" is an homage to the themes from the James Bond films, "She's My Man" tells the tale of a fabled female New Orleans river pirate, "Ooh" is the funkiest dance song never played at Studio 54 and "Kiss You Off" is a liberating break-up anthem sung by the band's Ana Matronic. Lyrically, though, Ta-Dah is not as full of the unchecked hedonism of their first album, with the vaudevillian "Intermission" proclaiming, "We were born to die." But even if the sentiment isn't particularly cheerful, the music definitely is. With Ta-Dah, the Scissor Sisters manage to be both big and clever, once again producing some of the smartest pop music you can dance to. --Ted Kord