owl and bear

2006, Reincarnate Music

Here is Jeremy Enigk’s formula: start soft, add some ridiculous synth, and then swell into an ear-piercing wail. Knowing this, the world might have waited longer.

The balding bawler begins World Waits with a track called “A New Beginning,” but listeners’ high hopes will be promptly scattered into a sea of pomp and bullshit.

And if it weren’t for the album’s already-dated-sounding production, the most telling track on World Waits would’ve been “Been Here Before”- except Enigk seems to have revisited his past flops instead of efforts like “Return Of The Frog Queen”—or even the first three Sunny Day Real Estate albums—that first earned his acclaim.

D+