Allen and friends have - no surprise - outdone themselves once again. I can't articulate what I was expecting from Allen's post-Shiner endeavors; maybe a little more of the introspective, quasi-orchestral mood-rock that Shiner began exploring on The Egg; maybe a touch of his Radiohead meets Floyd explorations. What I wasn't expecting was a freaking 5-course-meal of rock, spanning delicate amuses bouches to meaty main course to sweet and fatty dessert, and everything in between (including some excellent bread, but perhaps mercifully for this metaphor, lacking a cheese course). This is mature music, recapitulating many of the heavy rock moments that brought Shiner so close to us in the first place, but exploring uncharted waters in compositional elegance and emotional gravity. Dig this.
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