Loxsly
(self-released)
These post-Spoon Austin indie-rockers ease into their four-song followup to Maps and Organs with a spacey little ballad that feels something written in the middle of a Flaming Lips The Soft Bulletin bender, with bandleader Cody Ground's vocals cracking right where Wayne Coyne's vocals would have cracked. But as the EP moves along, they make their way through Zombiesque piano pop riding what sounds like a Casio beat, a mid-tempo power-pop song with unusual-for-power-pop instrumentation (including a banjo and church organ) and a closing track that sails off to the Virgin Isles with a crate full of late-‘60s Beach Boys on vinyl.
The mood is pretty constant, though -- subdued and eerie, just the thing for Ground to wrap that aching voice of his around in moments as inspired as "The sand on the Virgin Isles looks soft like snow. There's glass shards in it."
Standout tracks: "Lamprey Eels," "Virgin Isles." A. WATT
