Roughhouse

Between Daylight and Dark is Mary Gauthier's (pronounced Go-Shay) sixth full-length offering, and a compelling step forward from 2005's Mercy Now. Produced by Joe Henry with most of the musicians who played on his Civilians album and Loudon Wainwright III's Strange Weirdos – Patrick Warren, Jay Bellerose, Greg Leisz, and David Piltch, with Wainwright and Van Dyke Parks making guest appearances – it possesses a deeply centered, almost organic sound; one that reverberates the intentions of the songwriter without trying to meet the sound head on. Henry is able to present songwriters as strong presences, as the still centers of a chaotic, frenetic world that whirls all around them, leaving them unaware of the presence of his voice ordering it without being swallowed in the process.

A strange phenomenon with anthemic hard rock bands is that when they begin to mature and branch out into new musical genres, they nearly always choose to embrace both the music and spirituality of the East and India, and Pearl Jam is no exception. Throughout No Code, Eddie Vedder expounds on his moral and spiritual dilemmas; where on previous albums his rage was virtually all-consuming, it is clear on No Code that he has embraced an unspecified religion as a way to ease his troubles. Fortunately, that has coincided with an expansion of the group's musical palette. From the subtle, winding opener, "Sometimes," and the near-prayer of the single, "Who You Are," the band reaches into new territory, working with droning, mantra-like riffs and vocals, layered exotic percussion, and a newfound subtlety. Of course, they haven't left behind hard rock, but like any Pearl Jam record, the heart of No Code doesn't lie in the harder songs, it lies in the slower numbers and the ballads, which give Vedder the best platform for his soul-searching: "Present Tense," "Off He Goes," "In My Tree," and "Around the Bend" equal the group's earlier masterpieces.