Branches Grown In You CD

The brief instrumental "A Lot You Got to Holler" opens the Branches' second album with a disorienting blast of harsh feedback and guitar noise, but 42 seconds later, it fades into much more familiar territory. The quirky psych-folk of "All Appeal" is much more in keeping with what listeners expect from the Chicago-based indie rockers, now a quartet with the addition of multi-instrumentalist Tim Joyce, and the rest of Grown in You settles into a similarly comfortable groove. "Garbage Pile" has the off-kilter hooks of a particularly mellow Pavement tune, while "Loaded Guns" throbs with a chilling pulse underneath the glockenspiel and high-register guitar on the surface. The addition of Joyce expands the band's already eclectic musical palette even further, with pedal steel, synths and various bits of percussion swirling in and out of Barry Phipps' dry, reverb-free mix. ~ Stewart Mason

Audio Mixer: Barry Phipps.

Recording information: North Branch Studio, Chicago, IL.

Branches: Tim Joyce (vocals, guitar, lap steel guitar, keyboards, bass guitar, hand claps); Ben Schulman (vocals, guitar, banjo, bass instrument, hand claps); Seth Bohn (bass guitar); John Byce (drum); Aaron Berg.

Personnel: Seth Bohn (vocals, guitar, keyboards, hand claps); John Byce (vocals, vibraphone, drums, drum machine, hand claps, percussion, bells); Aaron Berg (hand claps).