The second full-length set from this California band falls right into the same territory: Pleasant, often quite pretty pop music that still somehow manages to be just off a spot.

Some folks might find that off-kilter feeling to be some sort of artistic statement about pop music. But I don't. Butterglory demonstrates a wonderful sense of minor key glory on a few songs, and then the next song seems, well, a bit off. Not really discordant or anything, but not right.

And I do wish I could identify what it is that bugs me. Unfortunately, I can¹t. There's plenty here to like and all, particularly for those who worship the new pop wave. A cool, varied instrumentation and as many songs written in minor keys as major ones. And you probably won't understand why I have any problems with this at all. I've been wrong before...

As part of an ever-expanding effort to create "the new Nashville sound", Lambchop has added string arrangements to its orchestral take on the country crooners of the late 50s and early sixties.

Except that Kurt Wagner (who wrote all the songs on this disc‹one song co-written) doesn't croon. He speak-sings the stuff, while these lush arrangements swirl about him. Lambchop may be trying to improve upon the legends of Chet Atkins and Jim Reeves and such, but the result is more a quaalude-laden My Bloody Valentine mixed with the odd poetic musings of the Palace Brothers.

Which is not the worst thing in the world. I can't imagine sitting through a Lambchop show without utterly crashing, but as mood music, this album covers the situation pretty well. I think Lambchop knows damned well that twangy karaoke versions of Elton John songs are more likely to be "the new Nashville sound" (and judging by a recent trip to that city, such musings may already have taken that title) than this stuff, and the folks in the band just don't care. Keep on keepin' on is all that can be done.

Mantooth (who produced this album and arranged seven of the 10 pieces) has put together some great musicians to help him realize his often latin-laced big band visions of standards and jazz classics (some of which were written for big band, some not).

While his latin arrangements are certainly on the better side of taste than Perez Prado, Mantooth succeeds when he sticks to more traditional arrangements. The glitzy take on Coltrane's "Moment's Notice" is alright, but all that big band flash takes away from the beauty of the music itself.

And that carries over to much of the rest of the album. Mantooth seems to have stuck to his vision, but I don't like it. Too much seems calculated for a more commercial audience, sacrificing the original heart of the songs for popular success. The rendition of "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square" is the best thing on the album. There wasn't much to cut out, and Mantooth's instrumental arrangement features his able musicians well. Unfortunately, most of the other pieces required more surgery than toning, and Mantooth's ear for "happy jazz" worked a little overtime.

Grind-y guitars mix it up with both a live drummer and a drum machine. I've always liked that, and the rhythms produced by Medusa Oblongada are pretty damned cool.

But the band can't decide whether it wants to sound like Fudge Tunnel or Megadeth, and in the end it tries to split the difference. I'm not sure what the right choice would have been, but this is not it.

The amateurish production has left a tinny sound to the bass and vocals, which certainly doesn't help matters. But Medusa Oblongada has created songs which start and stop in seemingly incoherent fits, and the vocals don't seems to be connected much to what the band is doing. To call this a complete mess would not be far off the point.

I still like the idea of drums and drum machines dueling it out. And with some craft time and a firmer hand from an experienced producer, Medusa Oblongada might able to find its sound without completely destroying any cohesion whatsoever.

The masters of tape loop noise return, this time without a bass player for hire. Alan Dubin handled the vocals (as usual) and James Plotkin took care of the music (which is also pretty normal). And, as anyone familiar with Old, the results are anything but normal.

Formula is lighter and poppier than previous outings. The songs are still long exercises in looped instruments, but the level of distortion has dropped, leaving Plotkin's musical constructions relatively laid bare.

I'm happy to report that Old stands this test as well as any other. Think of this as just another installment in the cool saga that is Old. Each album has seen Plotkin and Dubin wander somewhere new, and each time the journey is a revelation.

The liners send out "greetings to those who know and understand". While I don't think anyone can fully understand what's going on here, everyone should know that any Old album is worth treasuring. A love of experimental music has its joys, and Old is one of the finest.

I really liked Oppressor's album on Red Light. The band's technical-yet-noisy take on death metal was damned refereshing. I'd heard of this project, and I'm quite pleased to have it sitting in the discer now.

The live tracks (the first five) are oddly muted. These may be live recordings, but either no one was at the show (a shame) or the crowd noise was mixed out. The result is almost easy-listening death metal. I don't understand.

I'm not even going into the cover of "Looks that Kill". It's better than Unleashed's take on Judas Priest, but come on. It's the crap on the first half of this disc that has brought the rating down to "average".

The real treat here is the new studio stuff, titled As Blood Flows. And it's fucking stunning, as I expected. The production is lean and clean, showing off the band's musical prowess. The tight sound is like a knife slicing though all the crap earlier on the disc.

I really dig the technical take on old school death metal that Oppressor promulgates. The EP (last seven tracks) is the only reason to get this, but that's one hell of a reason. I can't wait for the next full-length.

Sludge bass and rhythm guitar combined with MIDI-ed lead and shouted vocals. Not unlike latter-day Anthrax with Tony MacAlpine on lead guitar. An interesting concept.

The songs follow more of a metal-sludge construction, which makes the lead work all the more anomalous. It works, amazingly enough, though I'm not that amused by the fairly generic songwriting.

Good enough to rouse fists into the air and stir up a small pit, the Sarmoon Brotherhood needs to break out of this trendy metal sound and find a way to provide a creative counterpoint to the lead guitar sound that is very cool. I mean, there's a reason the last Anthrax album slipped by without a lot of notice.

Fun and easy, but it could be so much more.

Throbbing grind that uses basic hardcore rhythms and metal riffs to decent effect. The production leaves a little to be desired, but the band's attitude is what keeps these two songs buoyant. The flip, "Tempest of Skulls", is a notch better than the a-side, but both are good.

Good, not great. The band is obviously trying to bridge the gaps between grindcore, metal and hardcore, and if the knobs had been twisted to allow a little more clarity, it just might have worked.

And good idea, and the musicians' execution is right on the mark. The songs are well-crafted and even catchy (a real anomaly when talking about this sort of thing). I'd love to hear more.

Scorn is just Mick Harris, now that former cohort Nick Bullen has left the scene. I was curious what difference this lack of creative tension would bring.

Harris is unparalleled in creating beat-driven noise. And that continues here. But what's missing on Gyral are the subtle textural shadings that made Evanescence so cool. Gyral has the simplicity of early Scorn without the occasional bombast that helped those early albums along.

And what's missing is the tension inside me. I never could predict where a Scorn song would now. Here, though, everything seems programmed by the numbers, which is why a lot of ambient/industrial projects sound dull. Harris throws enough stuff in to keep things lively, but he forgot to feather the edges with goodies. As bummed as I am to say it, this is an average album. And for Scorn, that's a real letdown.

Three years after the second of two sales disappointments for Def American, Trouble has extricated itself from legal affairs and put an album out. And the band that has been perpetually on the verge of being a Sab clone has edged even closer to that precipice.

But I'm happy to say that Trouble is still on the good side of that divide. The sound is crunchier and less melodic than you might recall, but Eric Wagner's voice is still one of the cooler tools around. And in keeping with the band's 60s pop interests, they cover the Goffin/King tune "Porpoise Song" and the Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows". The first is done with way too much bombast; the second is more experimental (with a weird expletive-laden intro) and satisfying.

At times Trouble still has this anthemitis problem, turning songs that would be nice catchy upbeat things into far-too-heavy wail-fests. It's that Sab thing again. But when the band sticks to turning pop songs into innovative metal blasts, well, everything works much better. Trouble is too idiosyncratic to really find a mass audience (and their Def American venture is proof of that), but Century Media should provide a good home for cool guys to keep trying to find that perfect musical buzz.

The thing I really liked about the last Ultraviolence was the ga-ga-ga sound. The lyrics were silly and pointless; hell, with the music speeding past 200 bpm, why notice lyrics anyway?

So this is supposed to be some sort of love letter to oblivion, Romeo and Juliet without the family ties and the suicide planned in advance.Well, the music is antiseptic enough to carry it off. The characters supposed to be devoid of emotion, and the hyper-driven keyboards and drum machine strip the music to an essence of pulsating speed.

But then, I just don't care. I don't care about the story (which the liners convery much better than the album itself; the song lyrics are clumsy and insipid). The main point of the album, indeed, is to listen to the lyrics and take this as some sort of techno opera.

Sorry, it just doesn't work. With all the layers of pretention, Ultraviolence simply doesn't have the musical acuity and skill to pull this idea off. While the story is about characters who cannot feel, there must be something that turns them (and the audience) around. And thta never happens. At times there are decent dance tracks, but because this is a serious work of art, even that gets fucked up to satisfy the needs of the plot. Like a bad broadway musical (and has there been a good one in years?), Psycho Drama misses the most important point: above all else, the music has to be good. And Ultraviolence dropped the ball there.