Faunts — Feel.Love. Thinking.Of.

Faunts' lush, layered guitar sound invites comparison to shoegazers like Skywave, yet the digital drums that dominate the title track and most of Feel.Love.Thinking.Of. are overwhelming. Sometimes it's best to put down the Dr. Rhythm and chill the fuck out for a bit.

I know it might be a touch hypocritical to applaud a guitar sound that relies heavily on effect pedals and decry a rhythm sound that's equally assisted, but the drum machine is really that pronounced. Thankfully, it's less in your face on the minor chord and reverb-laden "Lights Are Always On," which is reminiscent of early Band Of Horses.

Steven Batke's vocals swirl as he laments, "You can run away, you can run real far from this," but even the vocals are so digitized they're mostly muddled. The result is Faunts falling in a crevice between My Bloody Valentine and newer Radiohead, and doing neither justice.

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