When this album came out it blew my mind. I was just in the throws of discovering new indie rock that began around 1999. Bands like Built to Spill, Spoon, Wilco, Yo La Tengo, Luna, Modest Mouse, Eleventh Dream Day, pj Harvey, The White Stripes, Idlewild, Interpol, The National, GSYBE, pavement, Silver Jews and dozens and dozens of others had dominated my listening for the last few years. Then this album comes out and takes the Indie music world by storm. A band from my home town, shining a light on our music scene and dominating the talk around indie music. And then the accolades start pouring in from the likes of Bowie, Springsteen, David Byrne, Coldplay and U2. Anyway the music on the album is bold and beautiful and big and way too accomplished to be a debut album. And the live shows so incredibly energetic and epic. Well for me this was an album that defined an era, both musically and culturally (on a small scale). And the songs are all absolutely forst rate. SUre, no really new ideas nut the execution of the ideas they do have is nearly flawless. 5 stars