Check Engine

A light jauntiness tempers any usual Sweep The Leg Johnny proceedings that one might have initially suspected of occurring (saxophonist Steve Sostak and wide-eyed guitarist Chris Daly of STLJ are both on hand), albeit naturally maintaining the same level of breakneck pattern shifting that STLJ has become infamous for doling out. Sostak's sax playing is used delicately here, recorded with plenty of room ambience restraint to allow the dual singing to take centre stage. However, unlike STLJ there is an emphasis on rhythm serving as support for the song and not merely following the head-scratch riff as pure odd-time shuffle onslaught orthodoxy that STLJ in part helmed. In other words, if there needs to be a 4/4 stretch or two, then so be it; an attitude that they seem to, in execution, share with Don Caballero's collective last gasps, but have thankfully expanded upon and mutated to their own ends. So, yeah, play this for your parents, call it "jazz-rock" or something equally lame and inaccurate and let the generational sparks fly as you geek out and do those spasmodic point-to-the-air moves. This is the kind of sound world compromise that's strictly win/win.