Barenaked Ladies: Stunt

The quirky Canadian pop band Barenaked Ladies hasn't made it easy on itself: On each record, the group straddles the thin line separating cleverly geeky pop music from bland and/or cutesy treacle. That tendency and a growing reputation as a They Might Be Giants for hippies can't have made it much easier to pull off Stunt, and the group stumbles often. The single "One Week," with its freestyle raps and references to Akira Kurosawa and Aquaman, is undeniably infectious, but if it's a huge enough radio hit, expect overexposure to create a substantial, annoyance-fueled backlash. The ballad "Light Up My Room" lands on the bland side of that aforementioned line, while "Never Is Enough" and "Who Needs Sleep" land on the cutesy side. "Leave" sounds like a goddamn Grateful Dead song. When Stunt hits its mark, however, it's hard to deny its appeal: "I'll Be That Girl" is an impossibly crisp, catchy little pop song, while the album as a whole is mitigated by the band's sweet harmonies and crisp production. Barenaked Ladies earned its audience by alternating between sweet loopiness (see 1992's Gordon) and sweet moroseness (see 1994's Maybe You Should Drive). But too much of Stunt falls somewhere in the mushy middle, and that's too bad.