Deceptive Bends

 

    Deceptive Bends is a little all over the place, which is not a good thing. Typical of art/prog rock, the album tries a variety of different styles and sounds across its tracks that turn out being pretty hit or miss. Some of the songs have nice distinct feels that I found easy to get into while others felt pretty generic and weren't too captivating. This also leads to the album as a whole not really having a strong identity or feeling too coherent, because the different styles they try out don't fit together all too well. The standout aspects of the music are the guitar, both acoustic and electric, and the vocal harmonies, which all sounded great and I thought were creative and well performed. Other than that no single aspects really jump out one way or the other; the songs that didn't grab me just didn't leave much of an impression and thus have nothing of note to really mention. I will say, however, that a sizeable chunk of the songs feel... dated? That's about the best term to describe it. Listening to something like Marriage Bureau Rendezvous or Modern Man Blues didn't really sit well and just shows what a different age the music is from. I'd say check out a few of the more notable tracks on here, but the album overall is probably worth a skip.

    Highlights: Good Morning Judge, Honeymoon with B Troop, I Bought A Flat Guitar Tutor, I'm So Laid Back I'm Laid Out.

Rating: 3/6