Haunted-house piano lines pulse through much of Joel Peterson’s third Broken Spindles disc, but it’s the electro-assisted pseudo-balladry that this short, 10-song outing tries to staple to your memory. Sometimes it succeeds. Sometimes it doesn’t. “Birthday,” with all its looped dance floor insinuations, can be engaging, while the clunky synths of “Please Don’t Remember This” encourage you to do just that. Elsewhere, the consciousness of 80’s synth-pop Peterson brings to the table works better, as on “The Distance Is Nearsighted” or the psycho-killer lurking of “Painted Boy Face.” – Punk Planet, May/June 2006
