Waking Hours

After three previous full-lengths and two EPs, Athens' Japancakes have released their most streamlined record to date. The dreamy/intense quality of their music reveals similarities to Calexico, Tortoise, and even Santo And Johnny at times."The challenging thing about making mellow music is keeping it interesting for the audience as well as the musicians. Over the course of their career, Japancakes has managed to that, balancing the calm with the challenging, but never more so than on Waking Hours. It's not that the album is a massive step forward or attempts any radical changes to the band's formula; instead, it distills the best things about their sound into something subtler but still very appealing. While the group's pedal steel, violin, keyboards, bass and percussion are all present and accounted for, they're applied more sparingly . . .Focused and reflective, pared-down and grown-up, Waking Hours isn't Japancakes' poppiest album, but paradoxically enough, it might be their most accessible and consistent. " ~ All Music Guide