Shots (Jagjaguwar)

Ladyhawk doesn’t reinvent the wheel with Shots, but the booze-soaked charm of the quartet’s tunes keeps the momentum going on its sophomore set. The ramshackle opener, “I Don’t Always Know What You’re Saying”, storms out of the gates with buzzing guitar chords and a queasy keyboard line, setting the tone for this decidedly eclectic nine-song disc. A jittery swing beat carries “Night You’re Beautiful” before “Walk on the Wild Side”–style doo doo-doo’s take over. Outdoing the most melancholy moments of Ladyhawk, singer Duffy Driediger gets his grief on during the sublimely heart-wrenching “Faces of Death”. “I know there’s no such thing as endless love,” he pines amid weeping pedal-steel guitars and a soul-searching solo courtesy of six-stringer Darcy Hancock.

Ladyhawk finishes the album with two oddities. The economical one-riff vibe of “You Ran” finds the group at its most primal, bashing out impassioned, punky power chords for 90 seconds. Conversely, the closer, “Ghost Blues”, takes its sweet time. Exploring Ladyhawk’s perverse obsession with pub rock, the almost 11-minute tune lets Hancock solo at length before coming to a close with an acoustic-guitar-and-bongo jam. Although not as immediately satisfying as its predecessor, Shots is another solid collection.