Take the anthemic quality of The Arcade Fire, throw in the pop sensibilities of The New Pornographers and add a helping of The Polyphonic Spree's multi-vocalist leanings and you'll have a sense of what Los Angeles-based Bodies Of Water is all about. What Bodies Of Water doesn't have in common with those other groups, though, is sheer volume of players; though they sound a great deal larger, they are but a mere quartet.The songs contained within Ears Will Pop & Eyes Will Blink are joyful and raucous and will worm their way into your head before you know it. "Our Friends Appear Like The Dawn" opens the album innocently enough with a single female voice backed gently by a cello's deep drone and short bursts of percussion and horns. It's not long though (about eleven seconds to be exact), before the thing explodes into utter pandemonium with an entire musical's worth of voices and instruments. It's a song so adamant in it's desire for grandeur that the lyrics even seem to synch up with the music: "then he spoke and the locusts came/water gushed out from the rock/he breathed and the face of the earth was renewed/the depths of the oceans convulsed". If you presume that these lyrics have a slightly godly ring to them, you'd be correct. Ears Will Pop”¦ exhibits some not always subtle religious undertones. Ordinarily, such an attribute would turn me off of an album, but the songs here are just too good to let the theological stuff offend.There are some quiet moments on the album to savor, but ultimately, nearly every track becomes an anthem in some form or another, primarily due to the fact that all four band members contribute vocally; four-part harmonies and call and response style are standard fare. "We Are Co-Existors" might as well be the finale of a Broadway production. The latter half of "These Are The Eyes" sees dueling male/female vocalists chanting "nature forgave but I cannot forget" until whipped up into a proper frenzy. Warning: give that song a few listens and you may find yourself waking up in the morning with that very chant in your head.The biggest obstacle I see for Bodies Of Water is their tendency to "sound like" other artists. Besides the obvious comparisons to The Arcade Fire, The New Pornographers and The Polyphonic Spree, the female vocals on "It Moves" is very Go! Team-esque. There are moments in "I Guess I'll Forget The Sound, I Guess, I Guess" where one of the female singers is a dead ringer for Jenny Lewis. Elements of "Doves Circled The Sky" brings to mind Island's "Humans" with every listen. Still, despite all the comparisons, Bodies Of Water have created quite a unique and unpredictable record; where they really excel is in bending many genres of music to their will - from piano pop to 60's psychedelic rock to Krautrock to chorale. Their lofty reach, unusual compositions and musical prowess no doubt make this young band a force to be reckoned with. 84%mp3:> Bodies Of Water - I Guess I'll Forget The Sound, I Guess, I Guess Links Bodies Of Water [myspace] [label]