Describing Los Angeles based Silversun Pickups is a maddening task. They have a number of ingredients that sound quite familiar, but they also have a number of ingredients that are quite unique. On the surface, they’re an Alternative band that seems to pull quite a bit of their sound from The Smashing Pumpkins, but they also have elements that resemble Sonic Youth, and to some degree, a less theatrical Coheed and Cambria.

Their latest album, released in 2009 entitled Swoon is an interesting record to say the least. It’s a record that has grown on me during more recent listens, as initially I was disappointed with it as a whole. I felt that it was almost too pretentious on the surface. It felt very aware of itself, and each song seemed to swirl into phases of excess, and not the positive type. Continue reading →