This follow-up to 2004's Now Here is Nowhere finds the New York-based Texan trio carefully constructing an epic stadium-rock sound that yokes the diffident, tentative majesty of Coldplay to the surging, anthemic euphoria of U2: on paper, a pretty copper-bottomed prospect. But it's an album of surfaces, rather than depth. Their songs don't tackle any compelling issues - several betray a somewhat jaundiced attitude to love while others flirt narcissistically with threadbare notions of paranoia - and most of their efforts have gone into the arrangements. These are dense to the point of suffocation, both on psychedelic guitar stodge like "Daddy's in the Doldrums", and 1980s electro-rock like "Lightning Blue Eyes".
Guitarist Benjamin Curtis is clearly a fan of Neu!'s Michael Rother, though things are too laborious to allow him to soar like Rother. "I Hate Pretending" manages to ally a Syd Barrett-esque melody to a prog-rock bombast akin to post-Syd Pink Floyd, but more indicative of the run of things is "I Want to Know", a gust of grand prog emptiness in which Garth Hudson's accordion solo contrasts sharply with the leaden arrangement.
DOWNLOAD THIS: 'Lightning Blue Eyes', 'I Hate Pretending'
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