Short attention span reviews: Damning, praising and blessing

Praise you, Stars! You may not ever paint outside your own lines, but as long as the art is as utterly gorgeous as yours is...may you never stray from your sound.


Damn you, Fiery Furnaces! You give us the beautiful quirk-pop brilliance of Gallowsbird's Bark and EP, only to take it away from us, reveling in that spastic, impatient, deliberately-weird style that sounds more puked-up than written, and that you can't seem to do anything but anymore.


Praise you, Okkervil River! Your access to stores of rock hooks and sincere emotion makes the Springsteen/emo fusion that's so intolerable in other bands (*cough* The Hold Steady *cough*) not only work well, but seem so very near glory.


Damn you, Simian Mobile Disco! Yes, you've created a decent, fun dance record, but after reading the reviews, I let in that ill-advised hope that dance music was about to receive a new view that would tweak the techno approach. Anyway, I'll dance, but I won't be happy about it.


Bless you for trying, Interpol. Bless your little heart.