The Sea And Cake: Everybody

The Sea And Cake gets pegged as a reliable band that pumps out the same innocuous, art-pop fluff, album after album. It's hard to argue with that view; still, the band's body of work has traced a wide arc from the precocious complexity of The Biz to the low-key sway of One Bedroom. Since the latter disc dropped four years ago, the group has mostly hibernated—all the more reason to expect a Sea And Cake sleepwalk this time out. And on the surface, Everybody obliges. But tucked within the usual indie-jazz jangle are some warm, even playful touches: The saw-toothed fuzz winding through "Crossing Line" provides a jolt of contrast, and "Exact To Me" mates starched funk and frisky guitar to Sam Prekop's drifting sigh. The product of a band that clearly loves its formula enough to tease it a little, Everybody is another fetching expression of The Sea And Cake's never-changing moods.