Spoon: Transference

Label: Merge

Transference is the first Spoon album to noticeably mark a change in direction since 2001’s Girls Can Tell. But even in that, the band continues to be so uncompromisingly, well, SPOON-y: taut, lean and infectious songs, a bracingly live sound to the recording, and frontman Britt Daniel’s gravel-rubbed vocals and teasingly cryptic lyrics. In fact, the changes here are, on the surface, small: the record is self-produced (and mixed by Nicolas Vernhes at Brooklyn’s Rare Book Room), after years of working with Mike McCarthy, which draws out Spoon’s raw edges a bit; and the songs, while again sticking to form as catchy, minimally structured pieces, are somehow more uncompromising. (Extending this idea, the band’s video for “Written in Reverse” was played and recorded live — check it out on the Yootoob or something.) Regardless, Transference is a welcome blast of cool, showing that one of the best rock bands of our time can reinvent itself subtly and tellingly, while remaining broadly accessible and utterly unique. (M.L. Thrope)