The Kopecky Family Band's second studio long-player finds the Nashville-based sextet streamlining its name but not its sound, offering up a colorful amalgam of
Killers and
Arcade Fire-inspired, arena-ready indie rock and slick AOR pop that falls somewhere between
Sleigh Bells and
Fleetwood Mac. Alternately homespun and cosmopolitan,
Drug for the Modern Age is teeming with big pop flourishes and fist-pumping choruses, but it maintains an air of intimacy (both lyrically and sonically) that helps keep the proceedings relatively grounded. Whether it be life, love, death, dependence, or heartache (this is a band whose work has appeared on television shows like Grey's Anatomy, Parenthood, The Vampire Diaries, and Nashville),
Kopecky is mostly in it to win it, and stand-out cuts like the sparkly, ardent dance-pop gem "My Love," which charmingly opines "The worst part is that this night ends"; the brash yet unabashedly confectionary "Quarterback"; the dreamy, aptly pained breakup ballad "Closed Doors," and the anthemic title track, are appropriately earworm-heavy and brimming with the nervy hopes and fears of youth. Most electronic-minded, semi-symphonic indie pop outings (of which there are many) aim for the nosebleed seats without much attention paid to the rest of the crowd, but
Kopecky has found a way to woo both camps on this delightful, if not very surprising, sophomore outing. ~ James Christopher Monger