THE SECRET MIGRATION

On The Secret Migration Mercury Rev play a blissful, transcendent variety of psychedelic indie rock which comes across as a smoother and more laid-back version of the thornier and more hard-edged psych freakouts of their sister band, The Flaming Lips. Supposedly it's a concept album, though I didn't really detect much of a concept myself - either way, if you miss the blissful, tranquil airs of 60s psychedelic pop and wonder what the indie rock world would make of them, you need look no further than this album. Time was when I thought it was a neo-psychedelic classic on a par with The Flaming Lips' Yoshimi vs. the Pink Robots; its lustre has faded with me somewhat, I think because yes, it's very pretty, but it's also rather unchallenging to my ears, and feels like a defanged version of what the Flaming Lips were doing much more interestingly.