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LOUIS XIV: Slick Dogs And Ponies [Atlantic]

On 2005 debut The Best Little Secrets Are Kept, these SoCal glam/ garage avatars milked the casual-sex-as-comedic-art teat for all its prurient worth, crafting an album as seedy and hilarious as it was haunting and sophisticated. Still, you had to wonder where these swinging dicks were headed once the penicillin kicked in. Well, superior musicianship and a grandiose dose of attitude once again ally with the obsessive knob-twiddling savvy of frontman Jason Hill on Slick Dogs And Ponies, which revisits its predecessor’s depraved ways while expanding Louis XIV’s aesthetic scope. The best tracks (“Guilt By Association,” “Misguided Sheep”) revel in the group’s ramped-up affinity for T.Rex, with abrupt symphonic interludes (the strings performed by David Campbell, Beck’s father), seizure-like fits of atonal guitar and faux-British accents that come and go. Even on hip-hop-noir downer “Stalker,” Louis XIV can’t keep a lid on its strutting theatrics for long. Yet, aside from a handful of tunes, little here is all that memorable, namely because the hooks can’t see their way clear of the repetitive, robotic arrangements. A bit too fussed-over for its own good, Slick Dogs And Ponies could’ve used a little less studio swagger and a few more great songs. [www.louisxiv.net]

—Hobart Rowland