Still getting to a few albums that slipped by last year. Rainbow Quartz regulars The Telepathic Butterflies returned with their fourth album. Both guitarist/vocalist Rejean Ricard and super drummer Jacques Dubois are in high gear, and the band has been consistently excellent. Whether they do straight up power pop, retro-garage or psyche-pop each tune carries those awesome chord shifts and quick tempo beats. One listen to opener “Circle Man” and you’ll be hooked. The ringing guitars of “Lilacs” and “The Dillinger Plan” showcase the superior songwriting and musicianship here. “Like Esme” is a great mid-tempo love song with Rejean’s vocal fitting perfectly alongside the guitar strums. In fact, every song is a winner, especially a very Teenage Fanclub-sounding gem “Elegy” with sweet hooks on every verse. It doesn’t vary too much from it’s fast pace from one song to the next, but it all goes by so fast you may not even notice. Reminiscent of The Kinks and Beatles with a touch of Sloan for good measure, it’s what I call exemplary power pop and not much else needs to be said. It deservedly made it to #11 on Dave Bash’s best of 2009 list, what else do you need?
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