Bees Knees

Canada’s very own Great Lakes would have to be Hopeful Monster.  Demand a refund on your latest Sloan record, and get this record!  Hopeful Monster is all about the Zombies, Rundgren, Lilys, Love, Wilson and Parsons.  You get 60s orchestra pop with lush strings, bubblegum, r&b grooves, and country-tinged songs all within the first few tracks.  Hopeful Monster is one man for the most part—Jason Ball—and you can tell he has spent loads of hours in a studio, as this project has the sound of someone who plays, produces, and engineers.  It’s full to the very last note, and hard to imagine a better Elephant 6 record not made by those Athens/Denver collective.