Like Icicles, the debut from the Seattle-based power-pop outfit, This Busy Monster, is a truly perplexing album. First of all, throw out all of your generalizations about the post-grunge Northwest music scene. 'Cause although these guys share Built To Spill's penchant for disjointed song structures and briefly air a bit of Sleater-Kinney's pointed guitar work, the band is really more comparable to a heavy-handed Neutral Milk Hotel. Just imagine taking the Athens-based eclectic folk-pop darlings out of the Georgia sun and leaving them in the rain for nine months-- suddenly, you've got This Busy Monster.

Like Neutral Milk Hotel, This Busy Monster's work defies simple comprehension and explanation. Melodies zig when you expect them to zag, tempos rave up from plodding quagmires without notice and drop down just as suddenly, and almost uncomfortably revealing lyrics stand next to the most nonsensically enigmatic. To wit: "3D'd," the album's most musically straightforward track seems to contemplate dirty laundry, while "Hoops & Hollows," a tuneful, lovelorn lament ends with vocalist Christopher Posanna's frustrated musing, "I wonder how I ended up with this useless mouth."

On 1998's highly acclaimed In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, Neutral Milk Hotel drew the listener through the album's unexpected twists and turns with compelling pop melodies. While Like Icicles' most fully realized tune, the quietly beautiful "Stone Wall," nearly reaches that level, the remainder of the album lacks the focus to draw one into the its intricacies.

This Busy Monster has certainly crafted a unique pop album, an auspicious beginning to a career that warrants attention. However, Like Icicles is ultimately too clever for its own good, leaving the listener anticipating rather than sated.

-Neil Lieberman