While this album was released last summer, it appears the band has just gotten around to letting everyone know. Or maybe that's just a weird untrue backstory. Dunno. Formed at Berklee, this band has been mashing together musical and lyrical ideas for a while now. This is the band's third album, and it's the least cohesive and most ambitious of the set.

Church Burglars Welcome to Dreamland (self-released)

This appears to be something of a concept album on the future of America (why go small?), toned with Laurel Canyon harmonies and tempered with grunge, metal and punk riffage. Another way to put it is that any song might have a swift veer from Korn to Matthew Sweet (and then straight into Circle Jerks). Does it make sense? No. Not in the slightest. In every way, this album is half-baked.

And that's its strange beauty. After all, I think the point is to paint a picture of a society falling apart. Mission accomplished. Each of these songs is a mess in some way, and I think the tonal and lyrical fist-fuck segues are intentional. Church Burglars doesn't give a shit about your precious sanity.

Maybe that's our problem these days. Perhaps the only way to survive insane times is to go insane yourself. I'm not sure that's what the band is saying (I'll let you compose your own interpretatons), and I'm not sure I agree with that premise. But this album is right up front about challenging pretty much everything. And if you want to hear something that sounds like the Deftones and Chris Stamey deconstructing a .38 Special song, you might get lucky.

Jon Worley