After the lo-fi rockout session that was the Mexican Teenagers EP it should have been abundantly clear to us that Kaki King's lateral 'progressions' from record to record are little more than the difference between the methods that she selects to express herself. Lo and behold, Junior opens with a rock song about spies. Who had a mind to disagree?The word 'genius' is banded around a lot, often far, far to lightly. If it were possible to justify use of the term in a musical context, citing an artist with a fluent ability to use music as a pure vehicle of expression with true flair, beauty and a beguiling sense of apparent effortlessness, then this woman is surely a valuable reference. It's entirely possible that Kaki King, however, is not a genius. A safer description might profile her as an immensely talented musician and composer with impeccable technical ability and inspiring imagination. And if this sounds unduly sycophantic, you manifestly haven't spent a dreamy evening alone with her albums.Master of the 'grower' album, King has shown here that while she has a firm grip on the those creeping knockout punches that burrow into the brain and explode (see Until We Felt Red for thirteen such examples) she also has an ear for a quick-landing pop-rock melody, and can varnish it with just enough of that abstract, underwater soulfulness to make it warrant much more than a casual in-the-car blast past.There is more to Junior, than 'Kaki King goes pop-rock' however. Tracks such 'Everything Has an End, Even Sadness' are richly, satisfyingly vintage Kaki King. Lighter, simple melodic outings such as alt-rock head-nodder 'Falling Day', riff driven and opiate-level-addictive 'Death Head' and the almost unbearably cute, surely Mirah-nodding(?) 'My Communist Friends' might even have stood a chance of being stand-outs on a lesser album. It's on tracks like sparse, slide-laden dreamscape 'Hallucinations From My Poisonous German Streets' that Kaki routinely manages to hit the jackpot and score the gut punches.It could be argued that epic, head-like-a-cosmos masterpieces such big builder 'My Nerves That Committed Suicide' and 'Sloan Shore' could have easily turned up on the last LP, Dreaming of Revenge but it has to be said (and this is no slight) that it's in this tried and tested approach that the throbbing kernel of King's midas touch really lies.It's not a surprise that as such a competent musician, Kaki King can do most things extremely competently. Maybe, however (just maybe ) for her next outing it might be nice to hear her do what she does so well, and throw herself exclusively into those billowing, wandering, overwhelming compositions and guitar performances that make you want to throw your hands in the air and learn piano. Because what she does well, she does so very well.