True to their name, Evangelicals sound as though they’ve been worshipping at the temple of Thom Yorke. The Evening Descends is a reverent, shoe-gazing gospel that bridges the fourteen-year gap between Radiohead’s Pablo Honey and In Rainbows. Their aural tithing is more than mere songs; the group composes soundtracks for fever dreams. Riddled with reverb and petulant vocal performances, The Evening Descends is a wonderful, woozy record.
“Paperback Suicide” takes pop cues from The Shins, melding a gleeful xylophone riff with airy singing about a melancholic author. The jittery “Skeleton Man” straddles OK Computer psychosis and The Pixies’ shambolic tendencies. But it’s “Stoned Again,” an echoic anomaly, which really encapsulates the Evangelicals’ spirit: when music becomes an out-of-body experience, when it moves you so viscerally that your mind lags behind your limbs. The transcendent, barely-there melody takes you to a higher plane. This is way more potent stoner rock than Pink Floyd or Queens of the Stone Age produce. It’s a slow creep to serenity, climbing to the clouds on gossamer guitar strings.
The landing isn’t soft, however. The next track, “Party Crashin’,” gets ludicrous as the band playacts through the narrative of a boy about to have his legs amputated. The group is a bit inconsistent, but their Rev. Radiohead has less-than-divine moments, so Evangelicals are absolved for their sins of song.
-Melissa Bobbitt
Evangelicals: www.myspace.com/evangelicals
Dead Oceans: www.deadoceans.com