The Moondoggies, Don’t Be A Stranger

On Don’t Be A Stranger, Seattle band The Moondoggies aim squarely at what The Byrds tried to do way, way back in the day — grafting a psychedelic haziness onto subtle, rootsty folk/country. They take things a step or three further, though, by injecting a heavy dose of gospel-revival sound into the jangly guitars and psych-sounding organ (see “Ain’t No Lord,” for one; “Jesus On The Mainline” goes even more straight gospel, complete with handclaps). They sing about redemption and change and looking for the Lord (but not really finding him), all over woozy layers of Southern-boy harmony vocals, alternately Neil Young-y/Roger McGuinn-y guitars, and Doors-y keys, with the occasional sidetrack off into delicate folk.

Hell, sometimes they even do it all in one song, as with the epic “Night and Day,” which begins with gorgeous, fingerpicked folk guitar and soft vocals ’til about 2:30. Then the song revs up and throws on some awesome barroom piano for a liquor-fueled speakeasy hoedown, ’til 3:30 rolls around, at which point things slow back down a bit and drift off into full-on Floydian psychedelia. Granted, going from quiet-night folk to boozy ragtime to psych-rock all in the space of 8 minutes can be a bit hard to digest the first time through, but The Moondoggies pull it off.

The entirety of Stranger strolls along at a leisurely pace, all languid and loose-limbed; even when it gets louder and rougher (like on the rough, bluesy “Ol’ Blackbird,” for example), it retains the vibe of a bunch of (very talented) friends hanging out on the porch of some out-of-the-way shack, just playing music to play music. Oh, and getting wasted of course, while they’re doing it. It’s so damn laidback it makes me want to crash out on the living room floor, nodding along with a smile on my face.