REVIEWSDeer Tick, ‘Born on Flag Day’

7

• SPIN Rating:7 of 10

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Label: Partisan

If his lyrics weren't all about loneliness, you'd mistake the strain in John McCauley's groaned vocals as a symptom of some chronic medical issue -- constipation, perhaps. But McCauley's blockage is psychic, treatable only with a regimen of alcohol, painkillers, and "Little White Lies." And, as deft revivalists of "country" in all its forms, the four guys in Deer Tick are entitled to wallow. Luckily, though, their second album delivers doses of pop buoyancy: "Straight Into a Storm," for example, proves that rockabilly rhythms and dueling surf-guitar solos cure all ills.

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