Yes, yet another Smiths/Radiohead/Coldplay-influenced band of Yanks, but a really good one. This promising Los Angeles quintet goes for an airy, dramatic, unhurried, mournfully sweet sound that may owe more than a little to all those Brits, but they pull it off without sounding overly familiar. It helps that they have a striking vocalist in Paul Waclawsky. Although his gentle falsetto in "Mexican Disguise" warrants the inevitable Thom Yorke comparisons, he displays a dazzling range throughout these four songs. His whisper-to-nearly-a-scream dynamic in the epic, gradually accelerating "Motorola" is just beguiling, and so is his warm, fragile, almost androgynous tone (oddly reminiscent of Erasure's Andy Bell) on the sublime "Every Bite Tastes The Same". The music is also memorable, with guitarist John Treanor and keyboardist J. Phil Cobb putting an assortment of gadgets and effects to subtly atmospheric, cinematic use. You could imagine a track like "Hard To Fake" adequately enhancing a revisionist film noir, its reverb-heavy, reggae-like strut keeping time with the flick's anti-hero as he walks down a deserted misty street bathed in shadows.