Plants and Animals - "La La Land"

To some humans, evolution is scary.

Fuzzier and louder than their 2008 full-length debut, Parc Avenue, the trio from Montreal that comprise Plants and Animals are just as interesting now, if not more so, by moving beyond the sound many of their hardcore fans went gaga over two years ago.

La La Land takes the band’s prog-folk, ethereal float-pop sound to another level with the driving bass and marching percussion on the nearly five-minute opener ‘Tom Cruz.’ The plugged-in guitar sound expands further on ‘Swinging Bells’ but with the addition of orchestral synth-swells melting into ‘American Idol’ and its urban-retro horn section breaks.

Echoes of ‘70s pop-rock abound on ‘Kon Tiki’ with the expansiveness of an endless watery horizon, before the band dips back into their lengthy folk balladry on ‘Game Shows’ and ‘Undone Melody’. The juxtaposition can seem a bit jarring at first, yet the songs evolve with a bizarre cohesion.

‘The Mama Papa’ is an up-tempo cowbell rocker with percussion and choppy guitars that sling the mature listener back to The Pretenders’ ‘The Wait’. Halfway through the stalking, robotic bass-line of ‘Fake It’, Plants and Animals takes off on a fuzzy and pleasingly muddled journey through topographic oceans of sound.

Recorded in Montreal and just outside Paris, vocalist-guitarist Warren Spicer says “the Paris stuff is like a nice Bordeaux and the Montreal stuff is more like a baked potato. Sessions in Paris ended by 10 p.m., sessions in Montreal by 6 a.m.” As drummer Matthew “Woodman” Woodley tells it, “it was December, pre-Christmas, so we fueled the session with rum and cokes. They made us feel like Tom Cruise. It gave us killer smiles and made our enemies wither.”

Not so much a place as a state of mind, La La Land comes across as a confident sophomore statement, sans theatrics.

Plants and Animals play The EARL on June 5, 2010.