Toadies: Todd Lewis (vocals, guitar); Clark Vogeler (guitar, piano); Lisa Umbarger (bass); Mark Reznicek (drums, percussion).

Additional personnel: Elliot Smith (piano).

Recorded at Sunset Sound, Los Angeles, California in March 2000.

Personnel: Todd Lewis (vocals, guitar); Clark Vogeler (guitar, piano); Elliott Smith (piano); Mark Reznicek (drums, percussion).

Audio Mixer: Andy Wallace.

The Toadies' first album since their 1995 RUBBERNECK finds the band with a new guitarist aboard, but otherwise stylistically unchanged. This is alt-rock that doesn't sound like all the other alt-rock out there, mainly because the band has a knack for stringing together simple but devastatingly effective rock hooks.

Witness "Motivational," whose "get your head around it..." chorus doesn't really go on for several hours, merely seeming to because you can't get it out of your mind (the concluding drop down to a distantly heard Spanish radio station is a particularly good trick). Perhaps because lead singer Todd Lewis is the son of a Baptist minister, some people claim to hear religious imagery or themes in his lyrics: if there are any here (as in, perhaps, "Little Sin"), they're pretty oblique. Pick hit: The title song, which mates buzzsaw guitars and punk attack to the cutest Queen style harmonies you've ever heard.

CMJ (3/26/01, p.5) - "...An all-around pleasure that shows a healthy maturationi n style and form..."