Spoon, Transference

© Spoon

The band goofs around with language and, apparently, each other.

Music blogs have been on fire for months discussing Spoon's return, and their "back to basics" attitude, with their latest release, Transference. But how "back to basics" can they get? Spoon is as spare, straight forward, and minimalist as they come, continually honing their long-standing bare-bones drums, guitar, bass and keyboard interplay. Now that Transference is here, fans can rest assured that Spoon is not abandoning their trademark sound, or going back to their early proto-punk, Pixies-infused beginnings.

Instead, they are staying the course, sussing out the heart and soul of rock and roll with the precision of purists.

In Transference, as in past efforts, Spoon does nothing to excess. Their music continues to be solid and rarely complicated. At the same time, it's exasperatingly difficult to figure out how they can make the simple seem so complex. There's nothing wasted, everything gained and their songs are filled with more hooks than an offshore fishing boat.

Some highlights: "Before Destruction" opens the album with a crisp high hat and bass drum joined by a quivering funhouse keyboard, acoustic guitar and haunted vocal track. "Is Love Forever" is a sparse power pop pogo romp. The pimptastic "Who Makes Your Money" is a moody, atmospheric gem and "Written in Reverse" sounds like another Some Girls-era cut the Rolling Stones left on the editing room floor - all honky tonk come-hither piano and vamping guitar work. "Trouble Comes Running" comes on like a Replacements tune missing a guitar track - maybe too minimal - with Britt Daniel channeling Paul Westerberg on mic. And "Got Nuffin" is an old friend we first met on the recent eponymous EP a few months back.

The album closer could have been, or should have been, "Good Night Laura," a pretty ballad that Paul McCartney might have penned once upon a time. Transference closes instead with "Nobody Gets Me But You," a song that smacks of a love/hate ode to success: "Nobody gets what I'm doing, everyone else seems to look through it; Ah, but maybe I never wanted 'em to, couldn't count on it anyway; Nobody gets me, nobody cuts me like you..."

This may be true. The biggest audience they've had to date wasn't during a stadium tour or an appearance on Letterman, but through the use of their music in the film Stranger Than Fiction. Good as they are, major league success has eluded Spoon. Granted, they haven't toured with U2 and subsequently retooled their sound to capture a bigger market share (Kings of Leon- we forgive you for the greater good of rock & roll), but it remains to be seen if they will conquer the world with Transference. Lucky for them, melancholy sells. (Just ask Radiohead.)