The Mars Volta — The Bedlam In Goliath

If The Mars Volta's last two records killed any interest you may have had in the band, you'd be forgiven for approaching their fourth full-length with a mixture of caution and indifference. The band had successfully destroyed any goodwill they may have generated with their initial output, as all but the most drugged-out prog enthusiasts or misinformed teens were repulsed by the self-indulgence on 2005's Frances The Mute and 2006's Amputechture. Shockingly, The Bedlam In Goliath manages to excise all the excess from those albums and reintroduce The Mars Volta as a tight, concise and technically bewildering unit. Their funk/prog/Latin jazz fusion still remains intact, but everything about them has become 1,000 times more urgent. There are no momentum-stunting waves of sound or indecipherable interludes, just a collective of unbelievably talented musicians red-lining for about an hour. Now why didn't they just make this album three years ago?