Postscript

Jellyfish's clean, ridiculously ringing Beatles/Badfinger/later-Beach Boys/ELO/Skylarking-XTC buoyancy has fathered and grandfathered numerous adored albums — from Falkner and later Grays bandmate Jon Brion, filtering up through recent treats such as Red Button and Edward Rogers, and now this unassuming gem from New Yorker Litman. The unheralded Minneapolis native stakes this splendorous, perennial stratum hard, as the opening "Anna" forms a pleasing cross between the Rutles, Squeeze, the Move's "Blackberry Way," XTC's "King for a Day," and the Turtles' 1968 number six "Eleanor." (Litman's voice sounds like Move maven Roy Wood, albeit nasally like older Elvis Costello.) This siren style is so strong, Litman forsook his academic training in classical and jazz for this field, as if he majored in McCartney instead. And with strummy should-be-hits like the sneakily snarky "Everything You're Not," he'd have earned an "A." ~ Jack Rabid, The Big Takeover, Rovi