Low The Curtain Hits the Cast (Vernon Yard Recordings) When I say that Low are distant cousins of the Velvet Underground, I don't mean that they barely sound like Lou and company. Rather, they possess a sound that seems to emerge out of a distant galaxy. Transmitting from so far away, any excess gets stripped down, and all that is left are the bare essentials: ghostly vocals that drift through an icy terrain of brushed drums and minimalist guitar. Low are a band that sounds exactly like their name, but beautifully so. Past efforts such as I Could Live in Hope and Long Division were masterpieces in minor keys, the perfect soundtracks to that listless sorrow that plague us all every now and then.

Their new album, The Curtain Hits the Cast, proves a bit disappointing coming off such beauty. Sure, Low has maintained its trademark sound. The band has added some more dynamic changes (they go from soft to sort-of soft now), and they've written more words to sing. But somehow, it doesn't work. Before, their vocals possessed the weight of incantation simply because there weren't a lot of them; their absence proved their greatest presence. But Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker sing all the time now, and the whole thing gets watered-down and mushy. And what more, all the songs sound the same, even ones with promising titles like "Lust" and "Do You Know How to Waltz?" There might be some subtleties I'm missing, but by the time the album ended, I fell asleep. -by Kat