USAisamonster

USAisamonster's most emblematic track, "Desert," gets off with some serious acoustic slow-jamming, warbly and loose, like riding a horse. It is, in fact, quite a bit like America's "A Horse With No Name," all catchy in that sort of don't-tell-anyone way, but no more than a few seconds pass before the whole thing dissolves into fits of first prog rock, then punk rock, then stoner rock. And sandwiched in the middle is a drum solo straight from the pages of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida."

Confused? Good, because confusion is the only filter through which you can understand this New York powerhouse. Call them experimental, but make no mistake: These songs aren't really experiments. They all have clear futures, moving skillfully from synth to thrash and back again -- never wincing, never blinking. Somehow, despite the crazy genre-shifts, each song is listenable in ways experimental music rarely is. Nod your head, get hip to the unexpected stoner grooves, but never, ever try to figure them out. You can't, and that's the point.