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The most recent effort of long-time New York songwriter Dylan Sparrow and company finds him in a more accessible mode than on 2010’s Charge. On this eccentric album, one can hear hints of Missing Persons, Angel Dust-era Faith No More and especially early Devo (one song even reminds me significantly of the instrumental “Timing X” from 1979’s Duty Now for the Future) along with hints of prog-rock and even metal.
Despite the liberal genre-hopping, this is a cohesive effort that really works. More to the point, there’s little confusing it for anyone else’s vision. I don’t have a lyric sheet, so it’s hard to tell whether “The Light of Hopelessness” is about existential doubt or deals with political concerns ala Charge‘s “Cyst and Disease” (a criticism of our health-care sytem), but I do know that “Old Kentucky Zebra” (a country pastiche far weirder than even Robyn Hitchcock‘s “Sleeping Nights of Jesus”) is perhaps the oddest song I’ve ever heard from this group. You can listen to it here.
