Following 2018's
State Dogs: Singles 2017-2018
, New Orleans duo
Generationals
return with their sixth album, 2019's hooky and melodic
Reader as Detective
. While technically a compilation,
State Dogs
featured ten new songs
recorded and released as standalone singles over a two-year period starting in 2017. That process purportedly helped shake up the way bandmates
Grant Widmer
and
Ted Joyner
thought about making an album and brought a welcome sense of creative freedom to the material. That renewed vigor also seems to have been carried over to
, as the record offers a decidedly vibrant and eclectic mix of songs. Cuts like "I Turned My Back on the Written Word," "A List of Virtues," and "Deadbeat Shiver" are buoyant anthems, rife with a mix of fuzzy keyboards, twangy guitars, and swirling percussion. It's a sound that conjures a fantasy laptop collaboration between
MGMT
,
Bruce Springsteen
, and '80s disco mastermind
Giorgio Moroder
. Similarly evocative, "Breaking Your Silence" has a driving, mid-tempo groove and yearning melody that evokes a similar
Springsteen
or perhaps
Tom Petty
vibe. Elsewhere,
Widmer
Joyner
slide into the falsetto, Casio sensuality of "Dream Box," and draw on
the Killers
' emotive new wave uplift on the shimmering "Save This for Never." In fact, as with the opening "I've Been Wrong Before," much of
finds
striking a perfect balance between a thoughtful, folk-rock intimacy and colorful, '80s pop production palette. ~ Matt Collar