Conduct

Conduct features 17 tracks of drawling indie-rock, with a smattering of minimal country-tinged ballads. It's definitely a bipolar release, switching between these two forms on a track-by-track basis, but the songs that work best are those that manage to incorporate both veins ("Straddle"). The most charming aspect of Conduct, however, is its thoroughgoing simplicity — even through occasional bursts of humor (a '50s-pop knock-off called "Monkey Doll," or an unexpected punk tune called "Alice, All I Want Is Alice"), there's always the sense of a band enjoying itself, and never getting too ambitious or pretentious about their work.