Based on both the sanguine title and beachy cover art of Plants And Animals‘ sophomore release, La La Land, you’d expect a sun-drenched, blissful new batch of songs from the Montreal-based trio. And while there are plenty of examples of the shiny, superficial extravagances of the City of Angels, both in the spirit of the songs and the glossy production, the darker, more strung-out edges of the California metropolis are also clearly represented as well. The tenuous balance between light and dark consistently informs this record, to varying degrees of success, as the band gleefully bounces from the raucous to the subdued from one track to the next, all the while struggling to find a consistent mood and spirit for the album.

The trio turns up the volume on the boisterous, Neil Young-sounding opener ‘Tom Cruz,’ which gets the record off to a strong, assured start. There is a muted dynamic that pulses within this tense number, which eventually finds release during a prolonged, guitar-driven fade-out. The album then takes one of many dramatic stylistic shifts on ‘Swinging Bells,’ a dreamy, psych-folk number that wouldn’t have seemed out of place emanating out of the windows of a bedsit on the Haight during the late 60s. But given its brevity, it just comes across as a bit wispy and unsubstantial, serving more as a lengthy introduction to the wildly propulsive ‘American Idol’ than a stand-alone number in its own right. ‘Idol,’ meanwhile, drips with sarcasm and bravado, with as pronounced and poppy a guitar riff as the band has ever produced, which drives the song forward along with its distinctly American cynicism and Springsteen-like horn arrangements.

But again the album downshifts to the meandering, acoustic-based ‘Undone Melody,’ which sounds too much like an attempt to capture the subtle grandeur of Grizzly Bear to maintain much interest throughout its tiring six-minute span. Those rapid shifts in tone and tenor plague this entire record, as the band strives ineffectively to craft a consistent climate with these songs. ‘Kon Tiki’ convincingly echoes the laid-back, melodic ease of the Eagles, while ‘Game Shows’ again sounds too much like a Veckatimest outtake to be captivating, and drifts off just when it starts to sound original. Coming after that relative solemnity, ‘The Mama Papa’ is quite jarring, and the bouncy melody and repetitive chorus of the track proves to be far too irritating to be memorable in any positive way. I’m not sure if changing the running order of the songs would positively impact the listener’s enjoyment of the record, but the way it plays out now is rather disjointed and a bit of a mess, frankly, with disparate moods and dynamics continually competing with each other for the enduring spirit and attitude of the album.

La La Land really limps to the finish, as well, with the last four songs offering nothing too distinctive to stand out, as the songs all drift a bit aimlessly and flutter but don’t ever soar. And just when it seems the record might fade out quietly, Plants And Animals throw one more sonic curveball at their listener, with the goofy strut of ‘Jeans Jeans Jeans,’ which again hints at Uncle Neil’s enduring influence. But the lyrics are so nonsensical, and the melody and song structure so scattered, that the song never settles down enough to be compelling. This record seems to find the Canadian band really caught between musical identities, where they are so willing to try anything that they, indeed, try anything. And while there are glimpses here of the fresh innovation that made their debut so memorable, these new songs ultimately fail to find a proper balance between Plants And Animals instinctive desire to create something new and their tendency to overtly honor their influences.