Album: Blitzen Trapper, Destroyer of the Void (Sub Pop)

Longer but less potent and focused than last year's seven-track "Black River Killer" EP, Destroyer of the Void finds Portland, Oregon's Blitzen Trapper vacillating between the chamber-folk Americana of songs like "Below the Hurricane" and "The Man Who Would Speak True" and the more complex psych-rock of "Laughing Lover", whose serpentine melody and enigmatic lyric recalls Portland close neighbours The Shins.

The title-track is the most ambitious piece here, a multi-sectioned suite that shifts through styles – from Beach Boys to Queen to Beatles, and back again – apparently just to question a relationship. The unexamined life is one thing, but this may be a touch too intense an examination for outsiders to get involved with.

DOWNLOAD THIS Destroyer of the Void; Laughing Lover; Below the Hurricane; The Man Who Would Speak True