Passion Pit - Manners

Every once in a while an album comes along that just kidnaps your ears for a while. I try to remain in this state for as long as I can each time it comes because I hate the periods of disillusionment before and after. When each raid ends, I'm left salivating for my next fix. Sometimes I'll even set aside bands to look into later, when I need them, judging only by their reception on blogs. Passion Pit was one such band.

"Sleepyhead" was the first slip down the still-steepening slope for me. It came at the perfect time. I had just recently started to rebuke Owl City, but I still had the itch for catchy electro. My taste for high-pitched male vocals was, and still is, at an all time high, thanks to Animal Collective's recent EP and Dirty Projectors' Bitte Orca. Pit hit me in my weak spot.

Don't think of them as passing-phase material, though. I haven't heard electronic so diverse since Kid A. And then the bass drum kicks off on "Eyes As Candles" and they're pop. Vocal melodies are difficult to make energetic without sounding trill and stale, but that's just what you get here. Manners pulls double duty: appropriate for semi-contemplative listening or merely an everyday soundtrack.