Review: Spoon
Mon Jan 18 2010
Time Out Ratings
<strong>Rating: </strong>3/5After recording one brass-enhanced track on 2007's Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga with A-list orchestral-pop dude Jon Brion, Spoon goes in the other direction on Transference, the first self-produced disc in this Austin outfit's long-haul catalog. The result isn't a dramatic reinvention of Spoon's trademark sound; seven increasingly assured (and increasingly well-regarded) albums in, it's almost impossible to imagine frontman Britt Daniel scrapping what elevated Spoon to the indie elite. But Transference does present Daniel's appealingly inscrutable songs ("I grew up in a supermarket," from "Is Love Forever?," is a typical confession) in a slightly more rough-around-the-edges fashion, with fuzzier guitars and groove-based arrangements that sometimes feel like they were crafted on the fly. Call it five-o'clock-shadow rock.
Britt Daniel plays Sound Fix Sat 23. Spoon plays Radio City Music Hall Mar 26.
Transference (Merge)
