I Didn't Leave the Secret Machines; the Secret Machines Left Me

News that guitarist Benjamin Curtis left the Secret Machines made me approach their new album with caution, not so much because he was the heart of the band (he wasn't), but because it signaled that something was going to change for this band, which to my ears was batting a thousand so far. Something did change. I can't say it wasn't inevitable. Over an EP and three albums, I've watched the Secret Machines morph from an indie rock band with a serious knack for muscular epics that toyed with pop structures yet never eschewed great hooks into something altogether heavier, lyrically dopier, and musically more conservative. That's not to say that the new album has abandoned the band's experimental streak altogether; but boy do they take their time getting on with it.

One of the things I've always liked about the Secret Machines was that they were a band that simultaneously put its musical chops up front yet never put a spotlight on any one musician. If anything it's been the rhythm section of Josh Garza (drums) and Brandon Curtis (keyboards or bass) that has propelled every song, with Benjamin's guitars and Brandon's keyboards (again) adding additional textures. The result was something propulsive and atmospheric at the same time. Particularly on September 000 and Now Here is Nowhere, Brandon's vocals and lyrics seemed to come in as a way of progressing the story that the music was telling, rather than the vice versa approach from a more traditional pop playbook.

With Secret Machines, Garza and Brandon Curtis' rhythm section still holds down most of the songs. New guitarist Phil Karnats does a good job of operating more or less in the same territory as Benjamin Curtis once occupied—in fact, Karnats is probably the best thing about the two best songs on the album, "The Walls are Starting to Crack" and "The Fire is Waiting."

So it's not the new guy. The problem, rather, is that the Secret Machines seem to be turning into the Brandon Curtis Show. Starting with 2006's Ten Silver Drops, Curtis has stepped forward as a bona fide front man, putting his vocals higher in the mix, making his lyrics the centerpiece of most the songs, and structuring more and more songs around the chorus. This is a bad thing. All you need to do is listen to the album's single, "Atomic Heels," to know that. Vocal hooks have always been a part of the Secret Machines' arsenal, but they were mostly effective because they were deployed with a refreshing discipline, dropping into and enhancing a song that could just as well succeed as an instrumental ("Marconi's Radio," "First Wave Intact," "Nowhere Again").

"Atomic Heels" opens the album. It is also the worst song on the album (and worst song of the band's career). But to call it the worst is to praise with faint insult most the rest of this record. The entire first half treads similar ground as the opener, chugging through rote structures and mediocre choruses. "Have I Run Out" is the first song to attempt to stretch out musically but doesn't really go anywhere other than sounding like a plodding retread of Ten Silver Drops' low point, "Daddy's in the Doldrums."

But just when I was ready to throw in the towel with this album, the band goes and flips the switch in the last third. "The Walls are Starting to Crack" spends its first half meditating at mid-tempo before unexpectedly dropping into an abstract musical crevice, then suddenly reemerging with a burst of David Gilmour-like wailing guitars. It's not the cleanest left turn the band has ever taken, but it's surprising, and the first time on the record the band comes even close to feeling compelling. The track is followed by the drumless "I Never Thought to Ask," which juxtaposes itself to the monstrous closer "The Fire is Waiting"—an eleven-minute wall of sludgy riffs, bordering on out-and-out metal. It's the second time on the album that the Secret Machines feel unpredictable—which once upon a time was the whole fucking point.

I'll admit to being too hard on this album. It's not bad, just mediocre with two spikes of greatness near the end. Ultimately it just isn't that essential. Even if you prefer Secret Machines with more verse-chorus-verse structures and less instrumental jams, you'd still be better served to go for Ten Silver Drops, which has the breathtaking "All at Once" and "1,000 Seconds," two of my all-time favorite songs by the band, even if they are fairly straightforward. Most of the songs on Secret Machines could (and should) play well to the KROQ crowd—I'm just not part of that crowd.