Artist Menomena

Menomena lives up to its experimental-rock tag with its accretive songwriting process based on self-written software and its combination of saxophone skronk and over-caffeinated rhythms. Yet even as the piles of instruments climb to the ceiling, the band’s off-kilter melodies still improbably result in breezy, well-ventilated jams. In practice, there’s nothing particularly challenging about 2010’sMines, the band’s second album for Barsuk, but the undeniable hooks of 2007’s Friend And Foe and 2003’s I Am The Fun Blame Monster are in short supply on the latest one, as the band frantically cycles between instruments and vocalists in an effort to generate some friction. Menomena remains a tricky, eccentric act, and its live show is an even better, more wanton display of excess.

Updated 02/21/2011