the dark murder balladry of last year’s No Earthly Man in favor of delicate acoustic songcraft that shimmers like pebbles in the blue morning surf. The John Fahey–like fingerpicking on “Riddle Me This,” the album’s lead track, gives an elegant majesty to Roberts’ reedy, earnest voice, which invokes his personal engagement with Scotland’s mystery and mythology. J. NIIMI

 

Emilie Simon
The Flower Book ⁵
ITUNES MYSPACE
A French ingenue who’s both
organic and electronic
Simon is a Parisian songwriter
with a demure, crackly voice
whose music is rooted in
Björk-esque notions of how
technology and nature stream
together. And this record,
a compilation of tracks
from her first two albums
and her soundtrack for the
French release of March of
the Penguins (La Marche de
L’Empereur), has a vivid charm.
On “Song of the Storm,” she
develops beats by rubbing ice
cubes together; and elsewhere,
she embeds intimate impres-
sions of wood, flowers, and
water in her deceptively tune-
ful songs. Simon’s one cover (“I
Wanna Be Your Dog”) comes
from noted environmentalists
the Stooges. JAMES HUN TER

Roberts

Songs of Green Pheasant Aerial Days ITUNES MYSPACE Getting lost in a disenchanted British forest

Sticking to the dreamy acid folk
of last year’s self-titled debut,
Aerial Days collects seven home
recordings by Duncan Sumpner,
the Sheffield-based Green
Pheasant. Put to tape between
2002 and 2005, the pieces drip
with loner nostalgia, especially
the nearly silent “Remembering
and Forgetting,” a multitracked
Simon & Garfunkel funeral
procession through the clouds.
Evoking a patchwork blanket
of autumn leaves, his cover of
the Beatles’ “Dear Prudence”
comes bedecked with falsetto
and woodsy shadows. It’s a
stopgap before his next proper
full-length, but the record’s
imperfect borders match
the material’s sleepy logic.
BRANDON S TOSU Y

Swan Lake
Beast Moans
ITUNES MYSPACE
Collision of Canadians has an
awkward appeal
This confluence of shining indie-
rock lights—Destroyer’s Dan
Bejar, Wolf Parade’s Spencer
Krug, and Frog Eyes’ Carey
Mercer—produces a sound
that’s equal parts inexplicable
and meandering. But when the
trio aren’t tripping over each
other, they find beauty in a gur-
gling version of psychedelic
folk, reaching through the mist
and retrieving, as by complete
accident, gorgeously delicate
bits of melody and alchemy on
tunes like “A Venue Called
Rubella” and “Are You
Swimming in Her Pools?” It’s
alternately spotty and spot-on.
JOSH MODELL

 

Switchfoot
Oh! Gravity ⁵
ITUNES MYSPACE
California rockers seek
salvation, find it
When Switchfoot singer/
guitarist Jon Foreman cries,
“I don’t know that I ever felt
so alive” on the band’s sixth
album, he’s probably describ-
ing a new peak in his relation-
ship with Jesus, since that’s
usually what Christian bands
like Switchfoot sing about. But
Foreman could also be refer-

ring to the San Diego outfit’s sound: Oh! Gravity is their liveliest record, full of dive-bombing guitar fuzz, juicy arena-alt choruses, and the art-rock ear candy Chris Cornell favored in Soundgarden. Your turn, Satan. MIKAEL WOOD

 

VietNam
VietNam ⁵
ITUNES MYSPACE
New York scruffs look the
part, but can’t play it
It’d be nice to believe that an
electric blues band from
Brooklyn—whose members
rock beards, cowboy boots,
and Gibson ES-335s, and write
songs titled “Summer in the
City” and “Apocalypse” with ref-
erences to “chicks” and lyrics
like “Well, money and class are
just a pain in the ass for me / But
if you stick it up my nose, I’ll sniff
it up and glow in the ecstasy”—
had something important to
say. But at a recent gig, all they
elicited from the crowd was a
hoot of “Big Brother and the
Holding Company!” Sad. J. NIIMI

 

Various Artists
Serious Times ⁵
AMAZON
A brilliant compilation for all
your reggae needs
One-stop shopping for vibrant
modern Jamaican music seldom
comes as easily as on this sharp

collection, compiled by Brooklyn DJ Max Glazer. It covers everything from neo-roots (teenager QQ’s mournful “Poverty”) to the sleek digital beats of Turbulence’s “Notorious,” the most righteous crossover dancehall jam since Damian Marley’s “Welcome to Jamrock.” The tracks come DJ-mixed and stand-alone, ensuring that your conscious party will be just that much more of a breeze to start. MICHAELANGELO MATOS

 

White Flight
White Flight ⁵
ITUNES MYSPACE
Nitemare hippie-boy loser
discovers where it’s at
From the ashes of Kansas emo
band the Anniversary (who
recorded two increasingly
experimental albums before
breaking up in 2004), singer/
guitarist Justin Roelofs
emerges with this wonderfully
bizarre solo project. Imagine
early Beck, laced with heavier
psychedelics, constructing a
cut-up folkie/hip-hop montage
with gentle acoustic guitars,
hammering drum machines,
winningly out-of-tune cho-
ruses, and new-wave synths.
On paper it may sound like a
willful, clichéd mess, but from
the lovely “Song for Augustine,
Pt. 2” to the dope beats of
“Deathhands,” it’s an ADD
delight. JASON GROSS

 

FROM TOP: RIKKE IVERSHOLT/COURTESY DRAG CITY; MARGARET MANZER/COURTESY GIRLIE ACTION

VietNam: “Okay,
guys, so who’s got
the remote?”

W WW. SPIN. COM JANUARY^{2007 5}