Blitzen Trapper

ALBUM: Furr

LABEL: Sub Pop

Blitzen Trapper’s latest LP, “Furr,” is the kind of disc that will get shipped along with Cut Copy to whoever makes the hip-ish playlists for the late “O.C.” and the current “Gossip Girl,” but the only thing these indie bands have in common is their audience. Blitzen Trapper isn’t interested in singing ironically about hooking up in clubs; instead, their imagery is loaded with coyotes, buffalo and discussion of sin and romance that can get a little too sincere for the comfort of the secular masses of Pitchfork clickers.

They entered the scene radar due to the pure listenability (and thus blog-postability) of a few singles off of their third LP “Wild Mountain Nation.” The title track fleshed out their sound with dirty guitar riffs that waterslid through their clean production and led the album into several eclectic styles. “Country Caravan” used melodic vocals to conjure studio sessions of The Grateful Dead and “Sci-Fi Kid” displayed their talent at rocking with plenty of aid from electricity.

The energy on “Wild Mountain Nation” left their new LP, “Furr,” with a lot to live up to. Centering on themes of morphing from human to animal, and all of the implied moral quandaries, the overall sound of “Furr” returns to the studio with the same dramatic, textured licks and backwoods mood-swings, but this time the energy quotient has gone down a few milligrams.

It appears as if their tour bus has been playing nonstop Dylan, because their odd experimental pieces have been replaced with frustrated folksy pieces like “Black River Killer,” an odd but endearing rant about spiritual loss. “Not Your Lover” is a piano-driven tune with touchingly sad lyrics about feeling estranged from the person who shares the singer’s sheets. Conjuring that cigarette-smoking Hibbing native once more, they even blow into a harmonica.

None of the more energetic tracks capture the intoxicating sense of Americana so expertly generated on the last album. “God + Suicide” is catchy and tambourine-filled, but seems clever and engineered to the point where their old raucous freedom gets left behind.

Other songs like “War on Machines” and “Saturday Night” suffer the same problem. They sound so well-rounded that they’ve lost focus, making them occasionally sound like a cliché, campy version of their old selves.

“Furr” is certainly a well-made disc whose songs could adequately narrate any road trip, but they need to give us a little bit more sincerity and take a few more risks if they want to be true representatives of their “Wild Mountain Nation.”