Gnawing your way through the latest Mars Volta record is always something of a chore at first. The band, anchored by instrumentalist/composer Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and lyricist/vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala, turns out huge mind-fucks as songs, mixing prog-metal, psychedelia, and swaggering Latin flavors into massive, album-long narratives whose intent is to confound. The reward comes after you've digested the concept and you can focus on the... More >>>