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So Rogue Wave had been through all kinds of trials and tribulations, kidney ailments, family tragedies, line-up changes, and record label conflict. They couldn’t come to terms with their old label Sub-Pop, but they were snatched up by Jack Johnson’s Brushfire imprint, and because of that label positioning Rogue Wave has set themselves up for a really good shot at some serious success outside of the independent world. Even for independent music Rogue Wave is highly experimental. By listening through the record you would actually guess that these guys are from the UK (they’re from San Francisco), because that’s really the sound that they have. Their music has the thinness and the delicateness of a band like Travis. They take that Travis like delicacy and then they do some weird percussion alongside of it, and that’s basically Rogue Wave in a nut shell. Rogue Wave’s debut album for Brushfire called “Asleep at Heaven’s Gate” comes out like gangbusters. The first three tracks on this album are outstanding. They might be a little long, but overall they are superb. The problem is everything after those first three songs is hard to get into and almost sub-par. Even for Rogue Wave, they get a little too experimental at times and generally just not as sincere as they did in their early years. There’s flashes of brilliance here and there after those first three songs, but nothing else really lines up with the few beginning tracks on this album. This is this band’s third release and it had the potential to really launch their careers to even higher places than where they’re at now, unfortunately Rogue Wave came out with a bit of a dud. I’m only being so hard on the guys because quite frankly you can tell they can do better. Especially after listening to the first three tracks- that’s what this album should have been.