The Mars Volta - Octahedron (2009)

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Octahedron is the stunning new album from The Mars Volta. An albumheady with the emotion and high-drama that has always been the band'strademark, their newfound simplicity and focus has delivered some ofthe most immediate and powerful songs in their discography. The albumopens with the tender ache of "Since We've Been Wrong", Cedric'skeening vocal establishing a mood that's deeply blue, powerfullymelancholic, a suckerpunch that hits every bit as hard as Octahedron'sunashamed rockers (the gleaming futuristic funk of "Teflon", the tensechase-music of "Cotopaxi"). Pulling back from the full-tiltexperimentation of previous releases, the album invests its energies inOmar's gift for songcraft, for swooning guitar runs of high tension andemotive power ("Luciforms"' epic riffage), and for the nagging hooks and melodies that wreath the churning rhythms of "Desperate Graves". -Unknown