Something must have happened to Manitoba's Dan Snaith. His 2001 debut for the Leaf label, Start Breaking My Heart, was blissed-out pastoral IDM that warranted Boards of Canada comparisons. Then he went off and made some clubby tracks that dabbled in UK garage. And now, with his second full-length Up in Flames, he's chucked the laptop, dug the analog gear out of the dumpster, and recorded a 60s-worshiping indie rock record, complete with sun-kissed harmonies, layered acoustic guitars, Farfisa organ drones and glockenspiel. You have to admire the chutzpah. Seriously, I can't remember hearing this stark a contrast between consecutive albums in a long time, maybe ever.

The sound of Up in Flames is key. In contrast to the world of modern computer-based music, where noise is precisely controlled and each layered instrument can be mentally plucked from the mix and examined, Up in Flames is a colossal field of unified sound. The sheets of acoustic guitar and organ wrap themselves around the booming drums (mostly acoustic kits tuned to the full timbre of the Hal Blaine era) and you can't pry them apart. The obvious production inspirations are Phil Spector and Brian Wilson, both of whom arranged songs during a time when men had more ideas than available tracks. So they had to cheat, bounce, and compress, and the best records that came out of it were massive and unknowable. Up in Flames, whether by choice or necessity, has the same warm feeling of ramshackle Wagner. When it came time to record, "precision" was a goal far down the list.

Despite their obvious 60s references, most of the tracks on Up in Flames aren't really songs in the traditional sense. Instead of prominent verse/chorus/bridge structure, we hear a series of swells and contractions. Snaith has a good understanding of the tricks and techniques of pop's biggest and best moments, the moments that stop your breathing during the pause just before the big chorus, and he set out to make an album filled with them. "Hendrix with KO" (which is one of a couple songs featuring the voice of Koushik Ghosh) has some lyrics, but most of what you hear are just day-glo bah-bah-bah's that serve as suspension cabling to carry the track from one section to the next, through the Mamas & Papas homage to an electronic coda that's a rare memory of Manitoba's prior incarnation. "Jacknuggeted" has a similar arc but reminds me more of Neil Diamond in the Bang days, all "Cherry Cherry" handclaps and stiff-but-funky D/A/G acoustic strumming, but then another digital breakdown at the end brings in sputtering breaks that would have had Greenwich & Barry lunging for the Stop button.

As tied to the 60s as it is, Up in Flames can of course be described as a psychedelic record. The way the absolutely huge "Bijoux" swirls with Wilsonian harmonies, layers of chords, music boxes, percussion explosions and orchestral samples, I swear, it almost takes on a Boredoms cast. Not in terms of aggression, but as a primal celebration of the possibility of sound. "Kid You'll Move Mountains" is similarly dense, but this one sends a snaking soprano saxophone through the changes. A tenor sax erupts in the latter part of "Skunks", tearing off into a series of riffs that add the same sort of "free" element to the track that Stereolab incorporated into "Fuses". And the fuzzy "Crayon" sounds like Múm covering the Jesus & Mary Chain's "Taste of Cindy". Because Up in Flames is so focused on big moments and aural candy, it's wise that Snaith decided to keep the record under 40 minutes. He blows you out and then packs it up.

If Snaith were to follow the trend of most electronic producers, he would have given this project a different name, the way Atom Heart does with Señor Coconut. Though, I'll grant that there's some conceptual overlap. Up in Flames certainly has a wide-eyed and affirmative outlook, and features titles like "Every Time She Turns Around It's Her Birthday" to go with Start Breaking My Heart's "Children Play Well Together". And there are a few moments where Snaith's IDM head pops out of the fabric. But that's as far as it goes. The two albums aren't in the same universe. Is Snaith confused? Maybe he wants it all. Maybe he doesn't know what he wants. Because Up in Flames is such a good record, we win either way.

-Mark Richardson, April 3rd, 2003