Mannequin Men

Chicago quartet Mannequin Men doesn’t make avant-garde music, but its early material isn’t exactly user-friendly either. The group’s 2005 album,Showbiz Witch, was a fuzzed-out mess of grunge howls and distortion, though it also showed a serious devotion to catchy rock sing-alongs; that loyalty was confirmed by 2007’s Fresh Rot and 2009’s Lose Your Illusion, Too. The band’s self-titled latest effort doesn’t break much new ground, but it’s great fun all the same. Opener “Don’t Grow” combines sludgy psychedelia with a Noel Gallagher-like sneer, while songs like “Cheryl Tiegs” and “Why Do I Get?” tred well-worn paths of jangle rock in sublime fashion. Made up of several music professionals—writers, record store managers, and so on—Mannequin Men has fairly obvious influences, but they’re good ones all the same.

Updated 11/18/2011