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Fred Armisen has few equals when it comes to committing to the bit. Whether he’s playing Prince or gold-toothed Venezuelan timbales player Fericito on Saturday Night Live, Dave, Spyke or Bryce on Portlandia, or Uncle Fester on Wednesday, he inhabits his characters so completely that they can be uncomfortable to watch—especially when those characters lack any self-consciousness, are painfully naive, talentless or annoying. It’s a trick he brought to his public persona as well, especially his bits with Seth Meyers as the drummer of the 8G Band on Late Night, explaining that he was releasing his first fragrance (a suspiciously dark liquid that smelled like ink) or launching his own celebrity circus. 

So when Armisen appeared on Netflix’s Everybody’s Live With John Mulaney last March and announced he was about to release an album of sound effects on the Drag City label, it was hard to tell if it was real, a joke, or an Andy Kaufman-esque bit that lived in the space between reality and comedy. Even Mulaney seemed uncertain. And when Armisen played a few sound effects, the straightforwardness of it all only fed the uncertainty. 

Turns out, Armisen was not kidding — at least not joking about releasing an album of unadorned recordings of . . . sounds. Drag City released 100 Sound Effects in late September. As the Chicago label’s co-founder Dan Koretzky put it: “Fred proposed a sound effects record, and thinking he meant a tribute to The Jam, we were thrilled! When we realized it was a record of actual sound effects, we were overjoyed!” Koretzky was referring to Paul Weller-led band’s 1980 near-masterpiece Sound Affects, and the cover of Sound Effects pays homage to that album. It is also dedicated to the late producer and indie rock icon Steve Albini, who helped Armisen find L.A. recording studios for the project before he died last year.

100 Sound Effects actually contains a 101st bonus track — a throwback to the full flowering of the CD format in the 1990s and 2000s. The recordings range from seven seconds to one minute and 49 seconds. (A nine-track compilation on Spotify combines a number of effects by subject.) Comedian friends also feature on some of the tracks, including Tim Heidecker, Mary Lynn Rajskub (remember her in that torture procedural 24?) and his wife Riki Lindhome.

In interviews for the album, Armisen has said he hopes some of the recordings will actually be used by the entertainment industry. Licensing fees are a little unlikely, given the ready availability of royalty-free sound libraries. But Koretzky does not sound like someone concerned about how much the album sells or streams. Asked why his label would commit to an album with little commercial potential, he replied via email: “We may have different definitions of commercial success.”

Given Armisen’s commitment to the project and his craft, Billboard committed to listening to and ranking the tracks on 100 Sound Effects. That said, 101 entries do not follow. Some of the sound effects are slight variations on a theme, such as breaking glass, and, for the purpose of this article, are evaluated as a group.

Fred Armisen, “100 Sound Effects”

Courtesy Photo

Track 101: “Fred Walking to Control Room”