Rolling Stone  #825
 November 11, 1999

    Recordings
  "on the EDGE"

Sumptuously archaic cover art; minutiae-rich liner notes; the kind of ditzy
band names that send Sixties-psych nuts into happy spasms: _The Mystic River
Sound_ (Camera Obscura, CD) would be a cinch for freak-beat reissue of the
year - if there was any such scene.  The whole package, including boss
pseudonyms like the Sea Monks, the Tea Tokens and North End Molasses Disaster,
is a gorgeous sham, a pin-point mockery of vintage New England flower punk by
Bosstown's ABUNAI!.  And the results are as moving as they are ingenious:
hearty soups of Spacemen 3 fuzz and electric-raga kitsch ("Learning To Ask",
the public-domain folk ballad "Barbara Allen"); early R.E.M. as a Country Joe
and the Fish cover band ("Sweet William"); indie-rock jangle with an Acid Test
flair ("Rock Song").  The copyright date says 1999; you'll swear it's midnight
at the Boston Tea Party in sweet '67.
                                       - DAVID FRICKE