Annuals: Such Fun

It's

appropriate that the work of the late Bob Ross, the happily earnest,

afro-sporting host of PBS' The Joy Of Painting, adorns the cover of Annuals'

sophomore full-length Such Fun. The indie-pop group seems to live in one of Ross' fantasy

worlds, brightly skipping through vibrant landscapes to the beat of their own

shining, innocent pop tunes. 2006's Be He Me was a relaxing breath of fresh air

from the orchestral intensity of Arcade Fire and their imitators, and Such

Fun continues

Annuals' knack for taking the hollow sounds of The Cure and The Walkmen and

filling it in with cheery exuberance. Like a Ross painting, Annuals' sound

looks impeccably unblemished; there's something refreshing about the clean

polish of melodic mini-epics such as "Confessor." But, also like Ross

paintings, its songs' easy formula becomes uninteresting with repetition: Such

Fun soars with

wide-open harmonies—none more so than "Springtime," where one can almost

imagine small forest animals joining in with jubilant rapture—but it

seems that now Annuals have the technique down, they're just gleefully

rehashing it.