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Jun 14, 2011The prettier recording wraps up songwriting that seems perfunctory and performances that sound tired by comparison to the psychedelic dervishes Woods first appeared as.
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Jun 10, 2011On the band's sixth album, they're most comfortable in the spot where Guided by Voices ("Any Other Day") bump into the Kinks ("What Faces the Sheet") -- slightly psychedelic and frequently sticky, breezily charming and pleasantly woozy.
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Jul 27, 2011Woods should take the cue from Bill Callahan and what he accomplished with Smog: if you are going to delve into the restricting realm of lo-fi, there has to be emotional and appealing substance and quality in the songs themselves. Lowering the production quality does not, as in a double helix, imply that the songwriting quality will improve.
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Jul 21, 2011There's little doubt that Sun and Shade could be a satisfying 30-minute indie-folk record with a bit of self-editing. Simply put, Woods would be wise to keep the psych-drone exercises in the live department, where they're more of a treat and less of a chore.
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Under The RadarJun 9, 2011While At Echo Lake was essentially the same sonic blueprint as its predecessor, the mellower mood here is a marked change from those last two efforts, though it's not always the most successful of shifts. [May 2011, p. 82]