Mouse on Mars

Luddites, fear not -- Mouse on Mars has not come to alienate you. On this, their eighth full-length, the Mice instead demonstrate a keen interest in nesting within more traditional song structures. And while no one's going to be mistaking Mouse on Mars for, say, Harry Nilsson anytime soon, Radical Connector is hardly arch or forbidding. The German duo tends to construct its songs around an evenly paced bass-drum thump, drizzling electronics liberally over the top of this steady, primal pulse. Songs like the hypercharged opener, "Mine Is In Yours," and the glitched-up "Blood Comes" swell and peak like tribal chants, while the squirting synths and rubbery vocal refrain of "Wipe That Sound" seem a throwback to '80s club king Kurtis Mantronix. The result is the group's most vibrant -- and most accessible -- work.