Boris

Sometimes Boris is wacky, sometimes Boris is predictable. The 24th of May, they managed to be both at once, releasing one album of fairly standard big-ass Boris rockers

called Heavy Rocks 2011 (not to be confused with Heavy Rocks 2002); and an album of dream-pop

called Attention Please.

Heavy Rocks 2011 is non-essential if you have the first Heavy Rocks, Pink, or Smile (none of which live up to the godliness of such titles as Amplifier Worship, Absolutego, or Akuma No Uta), but if you just can't get enough, you won't be disappointed.

Attention Please, on the other hand, is a weird one. It's essentially a wistful dream-pop album with A BIG FREAKING BEAST UNDER THE HOOD! On first listen, I pretty much wrote it off as a nice little experiment (and lord knows, Boris aren't afraid of trying different things), but it actually grew on me by about the third time I listened to it.

I'm not big on the dream-pop stuff (I did listen to a bit of Opal and Mazzy Star back in the day, but I never joined the Bjork legions), so I'm not the best judge of how this works, but I like it quite a bit. And, though the description may have you thinking "Pixies" almost immediately, it doesn't sound at all like that either, which is fine by me, not being the world's greatest Pixies fan either.

This isn't a great album, but it is a good one, and very listenable. And, as an added bonus, it's one album that both the wife and I can enjoy.