Sunshine Lies

After more than two decades as a maker of sparkling, jangly power pop, you might expect that Matthew Sweet would start heading in the direction of, say, latter-day Nick Lowe, slowing down the tempo and turning down the volume for a more "mature" effect. Instead, Sweet goes the other way, making SUNSHINE LIES one of his hardest-rocking efforts to date.
While his unerring tunefulness is always part of the equation, Sweet sounds like he's been listening to his share of Neil Young & Crazy Horse, judging from the crunch of the guitars (not to mention his distinctly Young-like vocals on "Meltdown"). On many other cuts, Sweet's voice seems to have taken on something of a Tom Petty tone as he's gotten older; this works out well, considering he shares with Petty a gift for all-American, hook-filled songcraft. Sure, there are a few songs here that hail back to the gentler, more jangly popster of old, but SUNSHINE LIES ultimately finds Sweet rediscovering his muse back in the garage and wringing loud, juicy joy from the process.