Chad recommended this one, and while In Ghost Colors didn't move me as a whole, there were enough high points to get me to try this one.
This is roughly like their previous stuff: vaguely dancey (though not really dancable) songs with anthemic choruses and some hints of pop structure that leaves them sounding a little new wave, and more than a little DFA. This one seems a bit more experimental than the last one; some of it works (the Beach-Boys-via-Manitoba sunshine bliss of Where I'm Going and upswing stomp of This is All We've Got), some of it doesn't (the vaguely African Peter Gabriel / Eno-isms that crop up here and there).
The songs are more uniformly long, and at times I found myself missing the short-song interludes that broke up their previous album - the one exception is the gorgeous two minutes of Strange Nostalgia for the Future, which serve as the album's mini-centerpiece. Speaking of length, then there's that 15 minute closer that I'm not quite sure what to make of. I don't think it quite moved me the way it wanted to, but the structure is squirelly and compelling somehow.
I think the problem is the same as with their previous one - I like the songs, but on an album level I get a bit numb to it. Too busy, the vocals too crooney and ethereal, the instrumentation to undistinguished, it gets exhausting. Something about the production perhaps. Good in small doses, which is probably how I'll listen to it, don't see a lot of full-album runs in its future though 3/5
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