3 out of 5

Label: Yep Rock Records

Producer: Mikael Jorgensen

So they proved that they were ready to move out of the hazy indie crop of the world with the folk-pop awesome of ‘Aztec Discipline,’ and then they palled up with Wilco-man Mikael Jorgensen, jumped to a more radio-ready label, and… polished off some edges to a perfect lil’ pastiche that the Village Voice crowd can chat about while NPR buzzes in the background.

I remember first putting on “Fast Rise” in the office at Tower Records… and immediately feeling a bit let down.  “Let You Down” hinted at a dark edge that got fleshed out on the album that followed, and I guess I was hoping for more of that.  But the by-then-established pattern of opening with a toe-tapper was gone – first track “Harness and Wheel” is a well produced lil’ ditty, arriving at a safe under 3-minute mark and played and sung to perfection.  And the rest of the album follow suit.  “Aztec” was pretty short at ten tracks, but every song delivered, and while I wasn’t a big fan of Manx’s first two albums of 5-minute long sweetly wandering tunes, I dug that they would let the songs play out beyond verse-chorus-verse, but that’s also gone on this album, almost every song a palatable 3 to 4.5 minutes.  There’s no sudden blast of distortion anywhere, it’s wended in when appropriate, and the whole bag ends with a rattling wave of noise… both of these slight shifts feeling reminiscent of Wilco.

But you’ll note I rate this higher than the first two Manx albums, and that’s because the group are still evolving as amazing songwriters.  They might – on this album – have decided to do away with the more aggressive and cynical stance that I was enjoying, but it doesn’t change that their arrangements and compositions are smart and slick, and Bill Taylor’s lyrics have gotten sharper as well, clearer imagery and storytelling.  It’s all a little shiny and blissed out, but it’s good stuff, miles away from the repetitive comparative simplicity of self-titled and Let You Down.  If references like The Shins and Wilco and The Kinks make your mouth water (all from the press blurb for this album), then you’ll surely want to add it to your collection of vinyl that you never listen to.