Altered Zones

Tucker Rountree can shred. You may not know from it from listening to Total Slacker, but the lanky golden-hair has serious guitar chops, as you can see him soloing next to renowned guitarist Eric Johnson. But here, Rountree takes jangly, pop-infused chords over sweeping hammer-ons and scales. On their debut full-length, THRASHIN, the band trades their lo-fi beginnings heard "Crystal Necklace" and previous seven-inches, and puts a slightly glossier spin on their Transformer-esque melodies. Album-opener "Psychic Mesa" seethes with crunchy guitar and eerie lyrics about hippies, farmers, and other strange characters who gain magic powers from an alien burial site. --Ryan Ellis, Weekly Tape Deck

MP3: Total Slacker: "Psychic Mesa"

THRASHIN will be released on September 26th via Marshall Teller Records.