Dead Confederate

Dead Confederate's haunting sound is at once familiar and deliciously unpredictable. For starters, the way the Athens, Georgia, band mixes dizzying melodies with haltingly confident vocals sounds like a young Thom Yorke fronting Failure, while its music conjures some of greatest things about '90s rock — it's dark, it's moody, it's earnest. On its debut album, Wrecking Ball, Dead Confederate bogarts Mogwai's intentions: Dense shifts in musical barometer appear on songs such as "The Rat" and "Goner," with nearly crushing atmospheric pressure bearing down during key song peaks. But these brooding songs aren't so bleak that they're without hope; the music's shifting moods often roll into rays of pure sunshine, melting away the dark elements and leaving only thick layers of sonic bliss.