Distilling their personnel and their sound down to that of a basic guitar trio,
the Silos followed up 1998's reconstructing
Heater with
Laser Beam Next Door, a rushing collection of garage-style rock & roll tunes the group had been road testing for at least a year. Leader
Walter Salas-Humara focuses his energy like on no other previous
Silos effort, but perhaps the laser's target is a bit too small. His lyrics are direct, and even at times a bit too simple. The fuzzy guitar attack that launches "Satisfied" sounds predictably tame by the fourth track. "Where Ya Been" sports your run-of-the-mill derivative classic rock power riff, and comes of sounding a bit like a poor man's
Foo Fighters. Even so, the off-kilter charm of tunes like "Title of This Song" and "Wooky-Do" (in addition to perhaps betraying a large quotient of
N.R.B.Q. in
Salas-Humara's record collection) can easily make up for it. Requisite Spanish numbers "Sangre Y Lagrimas" and "Disfrute" are more successful that many of their English counterparts -- not so much for their lingual uniqueness, but for the fact that they are supported by the two best melodies of the entire album. Still, this is a rocking album that breezes by easily.