Marcus Church

Here’s the plot synopsis for The Marcus Church Story: Marcus Church really likes Guided by Voices. The similarities encompass Church’s singing style, voice, lo-fi production style and, to some degree, his songwriting. Unfortunately, Church seems fixated on the mellower, more accessible side of the GBV oeuvre. That’s fine and dandy, since Guided by Voices has released plenty of outstanding accessible, mellow, mid-tempo-and-below tunes, but when you strip away the hard-charging, high-energy songs and the outright loony weirdness, what’s left is kind of, well, boring on its own. The dozen songs here are all pleasant enough, but the album would certainly have a lot more oomph if it included a few barnburners and maybe a free-association freakout or two to mix things up.