Album: Breathe Owl Breathe, Magic Central (Hometapes)

Henry David Thoreau and Bon Iver did it to escape lives of "quiet desperation", but the trio behind BOB appear to have retreated to the wilderness (in this case rural, snow-covered Michigan) as part art prank, part escape, part musical merriment.

There is magic aplenty in Magic Central (mostly when Micah Middaugh's Bill Callahan-like tone plays against Andréa Moreno-Beals' floaty vocals) but the spell is quickly broken by in-jokes and too much talk of dragons and butterflies. My advice? An iTunes edit into a classic mini-album.