Love Drips and Gathers

The rare supergroup that uses the talents of all their members to their fullest, changes gears effortlessly on their second album, . Instead of delivering more of the bitingly political post-punk outbursts that made a firecracker of a debut album (as well as a continuation of and 's latter days), this time the band opts for more-personal songwriting and a softer sound that draws on dream pop, shoegaze, post-rock, and art-pop. Though 's take over creative control from , is as much on theme as was. As its -inspired title suggests, the album traces the ebb and flow of emotions, relationships, and memories of loved ones past and present. At times, looks back with a soft-focus lens: "Hastings," an expansive and touching tribute to 's late mother, is lush in a way not usually associated with , with a flugelhorn solo that sets it aloft. At other times, the band's hindsight is crystal clear: "Scratching at the Lid" explores 's relationship with his father, setting some of the album's most barbed lyrics ("What will they say as they put you in the ground?") to some of the most irresistibly sugary dream pop that any of 's members have concocted -- which is saying something. However, even when the band revisits the sounds many of their fans love most, they add new twists instead of retreading. Named for and dedicated to late art director , "V.O."'s heavy, shimmering psych-gaze feels like a fitting but not predictable homage to the man responsible for much of the label's beautifully cryptic imagery, while "Loveable"'s hints of exotica contrast its down-to-earth look at love. As it comes to a close, only grows more adventurous, with a pair of -like excursions that add a cosmic depth to the softly drifting mood on which the album began. A frequently lovely album born out of introspection and loss, captures the complex ways life and music change while upholding 's musical legacy. ~ Heather Phares