Pterodactyl's third album demonstrates two key things off the bat. First, they're perfectly at home in the world of indie-as-huge-sounding-singalongs with guitar lines that are part shoegaze and part Wall of Sound. Second, they're so at home that it's nearly impossible to separate this from its larger context, after a decade-plus of popular successes such as
the Flaming Lips in their 21st century guise,
the Arcade Fire, and many other bands besides. It's not that there's something inherently wrong with songs like "Searchers" and "The Break"; it's just that there's something so done to death in their approach that there's little one can do with most of
Spills Out except nod and maybe sigh a bit at how paint-by-numbers it feels. As a result, one relishes those moments that are somewhat more of an exception to the rule, such as the slower and dirtier-sounding "Allergy Shots," where the contrast with the softer, calmer vocals provides the album's first truly strong moment. The even slower, doom-tinged trudge of "Thorn" and the increasingly noisy, frenetic melodrama of "Zombies" show that if the bandmembers let themselves go a little more -- and sooner, in the course of an album -- they might have something more to offer with the end results. But a few strong moments don't make a full release succeed. ~ Ned Raggett