I’m not going to lie, I’ve been spinning Circuital on repeat since it first leaked to the web last month.  I actually did consider waiting – I had the vinyl on preorder and was well aware of the sound quality issues presented by early internet leaks, but my curiosity and anticipation got the best of me.  I could have written this review after the first twenty or so listens of these MP3 files, but the more I listened to this album the more I wanted to get it right.

So often in the world of music blogs, there is an instant gratification aspect to writing album reviews.  Time is of the essence and if a review isn’t posted by the release date you are seen as missing the boat.   Most of the time this is no big deal, as after a few dedicated listens I can generally form a pretty informed opinion and don’t mind putting myself out there a bit.  The problem arises when you want to say something more.  The bolder of statements need backing up, and need time and a whole lot of listens to properly set in.  There are albums that struck me as wonderful off the bat and later sunk to the depths of my ipod, and then there are albums that I could take or leave that end up turning into favorites over time.

Circuital for me was something in between.  After a few listens, I loved the album.  After a few dozen listens, I still loved the album.  So here I am backed into a corner where I am all about the new album from a band I love, and now it’s proclamation time.  I could take the easy way out and throw out cliches  “A return to form after the disappointing Evil Urges album” .  Well, I for one kind of digged what the band was doing with Evil Urges, so I’m not going to go there.   “An album that captures the energy of one of our generation’s great live bands” .  Well I don’t really think that either – this album is very polished and incredibly well produced.  I’ll also save you the seemingly obligatory comparisons to The Who, Prince or The Rolling Stones.  Jacket is a band that doesn’t provide an easy frame of reference, and is becoming  increasingly difficult to define.

Enough about what I don’t think, we are four paragraphs into and album review and it is proclamation time. Circuital’s ten tracks provide an incredibly diverse and complete effort from a band firing on all cylinders.  Each track is completely unique and different, yet the album is remarkably concise.  James’ vocals soar throughout this record, and “the way that he sings” just seems to be getting better and better. The high points are here, and there is truly not a week track in the bunch.  The opening side of the record – “Victory Dance” and “Circuital” is so good it is ridiculous, and the album never looks back before slowing things down on the tail end with the standout “Slow Slow Tune” and “Movin Away”.  In between are 6 tracks that seem to get better with every listen.  Despite lacking some of the experimental nature of some of it’s predecessors, this is not a safe record.  “Holding onto Black Metal” for instance finds the band rolling the same dice they rolled with “Highly Suspicious”, but this time they came up 7′s.  “Wonderful”, a slow little ballad that risks “cheesy” callouts from the more cynical among us – might actually be my favorite of the bunch.

I feel like a lot of the indie press takes a band like My Morning Jacket for granted.  They are taken as a given, with little fanfare as hipster bands of the moment receive all the cool points and high marks for their often forgettable albums,  while a band like MMJ is quickly dismissed as falling short of their past classics.  Fair or not, lets take a second to put this in perspective.   Picture a band that no one had ever heard of coming out of the gate and dropping an album like Circuital.  I have a feeling we would be looking at the album from a totally different perspective.  Not only would every hipster writer be proclaiming them as the next big thing, but I am fairly certain some minds would be blown along the way.  The bottom line here is that Circuital is a full blown winner, and I for one am hopping up on my soapbox and treating it as such.

If there is a better album than Circuital released this year, I would like to hear it.