Eels – Cookie Happened

It’s been almost 30 years since Eels first burst into the UK charts with some Novocaine for the Soul, offering a sardonic American alternative to Britpop’s overblown hegemonic phase.

Now on their 16^th studio album, Cookie Happened, frontman Mark Oliver Everett and co have drawn on some typically offbeat inspiration: Cookie Monster. The title comes from Sesame Street’s doughy treat addict’s profound philosophical maxim, “Me no cry because cookie is finished. Me smile because cookie happened.”

Words to live by, and ones that oddly capture the record’s marrying of contemplative melancholy with genuine affection for life.

Opener Clobbers begins with a jangly 60s pop sensibility that combines with lyrics referencing a low point reached but passed.

This leads into Cap in Hand, where Everett sings of being a “broken man who’s picking up the pieces”. Again, this catchier song looks back on tough times but sees a future.

All Forgotten represents the album’s lodestar, with its strings backing reflections on mortality and leaving past troubles behind. Anyone sensing a theme here would be right.

It could sound gloomy, but in Eels’ hands, All Forgotten’s a touching and important counterpoint to the quirky optimism-despite-everything that is Cookie Happened’s golden thread. One that runs through what follows in Bamboozled Again and Lost and Barking.

The ballad Taking Pictures slows things down again, with the tenderness of Everett’s vocals adding sweetness to its piano lines.

Cookie Happened then shifts somewhat. There’s some upbeat Americana with hints of garage rock on New Story, followed by the whirring psychedelia of what may be the album’s standout track, the harp-infused Congratulations to Me.

Another subtle directional shift comes with the folky and even more intimate One Razzle, One Dazzle, which recalls advice from Everett’s late father. It’s followed by On Standby – an anthemic celebration of friends getting each other through tough times.

After all that, closing tracks Dum Dums and The Way I Was Made are something of an anticlimactic, downbeat coda. That’s not to say they’re bad, more a reflection of what has gone before and how perfectly Everett’s songwriting manages to partake in wistful cogitation without turning into a musical Eeyore.

True to its title’s wry humour, Cookie Happened is a lovely record, and one that could probably only be made by a band now well into middle age – with plenty of mistakes and traumas behind them.

It’s one that never feels tired and weary, though, due to its eclectic musical references and Everett’s inherent wit.

Mark Worgan
Image: Courtesy of Eels

Cookie Happened is released on 16^th October 2026. For further information or to order the album, visit Eels’s website here.

Watch the video for Cap in Hand here: