Pitchfork

I'm pretty sure Evangelicals aren't actual evangelicals, but their debut album seems bound to blind faith, a fearless lack of direction or discretion. It figures that they come from Oklahoma, the buckle of the Bible Belt and an unlikely wellspring for freakazoid pop bands like the Flaming Lips. There must be something in the water. But where Wayne Coyne can now afford a proper filtration system, the Evangelicals are lapping up whatever non-purified, mystical elixir flows through the town by the trough-load, and they seem gleefully unconcerned if they piss their pants doing it.

Evangelicals don't have beards, but sound like they should. On their scruffy surface, they're a trio of cosmic cowboys following a path laid down by Grandaddy and currently trod-upon by Band of Horses-- artists making music that evokes open skies and horizons stretching for moonlit miles. What sets Evangelicals apart is a refreshing lack of preciousness. Singer and guitarist Josh Jones may possess a fidgety, helium-high quiver endemic to sensitive guys in indie rock bands, but the tone of his voice has more to do with agility than fragility.

The tracks on So Gone don't rock and roll, twist and shout, or perform any of the standard motor functions we expect of pop songs. Instead, they accelerate, crash, reboot, reformat: "Another Day (And Yoor Still Knocked Out)" sucks you into a whirling dervish of early Dino Jr. guitar-screech and vacuum-cleaner squall that quickly corrects itself in time for Jones' languid verses. These songs are restless and often literally breathless-- "Here Comes Trouble" actually stops its galloping opening riff for a quick open-mouth gasp of air. Even more assured turns like the jingle-jangle morning glory of "Diving" or the Stuart Murdoch-worthy jaunt "What An Actress Does Best" give way to light-headedness and eventually lose their equilibrium through jarring rave-ups, stuttering drum beats, left-field distorto-guitar solos, or the emergence of ghostly hums from the shadows. So Gone is spacious and expansive, but also oddly tactile-- the sonic details aren't purposefully introduced, they just intrude when they feel like it.

Like the Lips, it'd be easy to attribute Evangelicals' apparent instability to chemical concerns, but doing so would discount the graceful gait of "My Headache", a swooning ballroom waltz that ponders the inverse relationship between love and insanity. To secular observers, religion strikes a similarly precarious balance between faith and foolishness, and that's what ultimately ties Evangelicals to their small-e namesakes: The fine line between speaking the truth and speaking in tongues.