It's out of this world

The members of the New York-bred band stellastarr* enjoy the confusion of being unusual. For starters, their name breaks three conventions of the English language: the first letter of the name is lowercase, they misspell "star," and they have an unpronounceable symbol at the end.

Usually, when a band relies so heavily on cleverness in the construction of its image, the image is all the band has, and there's nothing underneath that cool exterior. Happily, stellastarr* is not a usual band.

"In the Walls," the opening song on stellastarr*'s self-titled debut album, starts off sounding emo-ish; vocalist Shawn Christensen's voice is soft and plaintive. Then, at the 30-second mark, he launches into the yelping, throaty crooning that brings to mind Talking Heads' David Byrne.

Christensen challenges the bounds of what is considered ridiculous, tossing off lines like "My recurring fear of being tied down," and "When I was down and failing life," with such earnestness that they seem almost logical.

Indeed, the vocals are one of the most impressive facets of the stellastarr* sound. Voices of three out of the four band members are showcased on the album. On "Somewhere across Forever," the disparate voices of Christensen, bassist Amanda Tannen, and guitarist Michael Jurin overlap and somehow manage to complement each other. Drummer Arthur Kremer doesn't sing, but makes up for it by putting in double duty with keyboard work.

The most enjoyable song is "My Coco," which starts off as a lazy, almost surfer-like song before it's pummeled by "Rio"-esque soaring guitar and drum work, causing the listener to wonder if Duran Duran is making a secret guest appearance on the album. With the extreme sounds of "My Coco," it's hard to believe that the members of stellastarr* are nothing more than superficially constructed poseurs. How could anyone worried about his image belt out lines like "which way to go go GO go"?

And yet despite the band's sometimes shallow sound, there is something very theatrical about stellastarr*. The jazzy high-hat cymbals and showy drum rolls on "Jenny" sound like either a marching band performance or a late night talk show's musical group.

"Moongirl" is futuristic, but in a 1980s kind of way, with almost cheesy low-budget outer space movie sound effects. The dramatic effect is only believable because of the band's sincerity about its affectations.

One of stellastarr*'s favorite tricks throughout the album is to challenge the listener's expectations. Tannen was trained in the cello and had never played bass before joining the band. Not to mention that she's a woman, which is fairly uncommon among the bassists of today's upcoming NYC bands (or in general, for that matter). Still, she's awesome. The rhythmic backing she supplies on "Homeland" is especially complex and powerful, but her prowess is obvious on every other track of the album as well.

stellastarr*'s cleverness is reflected in its lyrics, in addition to its unusual style of instrumentation. In "Untitled," Christensen asks us (and presumably the song itself) "What's your name?" In "A Million Reasons," he mocks himself, singing that he'd like to blame his aforementioned fear of being tied down on "the artist in me." We never know if we should expect thought-provoking lyrics like these or silly ones like "I'll run away/build a goldmine" ("Somewhere Across Forever").

Even with this lyrical confusion, as listeners, we think that at least we understand that stellastarr*'s instrumental style is '80s glam. Then we get "Untitled," the most stripped down song on the album. Jurin's strumming is gentle and honest and seems to go backwards in time, past the '80s sound of most of the album to an era before electric guitars. Kremer's keyboard is so childish and uncomplicated that it sounds like something on a Casio by a couple of creative second graders. This refreshing simplicity makes us believe in stellastarr*'s carefully constructed honesty.

The song immediately following "Untitled"'s beautiful innocence is "Pulp Song," in which Christensen and Tannen drone together "We're lying/we've lied to you/we've lied to make our point of view."

So what was the lie? The gentle sound of "Untitled," or the punkish "My Coco," or the David Bowie "Space Oddity"-era "Moongirl"? Or all of these?

Perhaps the lie began with the assumption that the listener knows what to expect from a band like stellsstarr* just by looking at the album cover. After 43 minutes, it's difficult to be sure of anything anymore, but perhaps the best thing to do is to listen to stellastarr* many times and try to figure it out.