Portugal. The Man/Wintersleep/Earl Greyhound

The Portland-based, Alaska-formed experimentalists Portugal. The Man tastefully assemble an amalgam of sounds and styles on their latest album, Censored Colors. Amospheric falsetto background vocals and gritty, vintage-sounding string arrangements support the band's soul-tinged dreamscapes, calling to mind the slow-building emotion of Spiritualized but with more of a shadowy vibe. "Lay Me Back Down" echoes the experimental psychedelic revivalism of recent work by bands such as MGMT and Of Montreal, but it has a decidedly Pacific-Northwestern infusion of straightforward indie-folk in the vein of fellow Portland troubadours The Decemberists. This quality triple bill of touring nationals is rounded out by the big drum bombast and thickly textured walls of vocal and guitar bliss produced by Canadian indie-rockers Wintersleep and the heavy, tube-amp crunchiness and deliberate rhythm section grooves of New York classic rockers Earl Greyhound.