I'm not sure if it's good or bad when a compilation of nearly twenty different bands (mostly from the midwest, with a few Californians thrown in) sounds almost as if it might be an album by only one band. Such an approach helps give the CD a consistent flow but raises obvious questions about originality or even slavish imitation. Fortunately, originality in modern music is highly overrated. Most songs here are sparely, deliberately arranged - the opposite of a loose, "play what you feel" approach. The interlocking guitar/bass opening of "Don't Let Me Let You Down" by the artists formerly known as Redlevel (now Broadcaster) provides an effective illustration. In concert with vocals that are often intense and affect-laden, the music creates a tension suggestive of struggle, emotion, a search for some elusive outlet. While the tracks that establish the comp's overall style are mostly well-done - the immortal Loomis makes an appearance here, at a more subdued pole of their sound - a few songs break free of the disc's reigning stylistic ideals, to varying degrees and with varying degrees of success. The Afterthought assembles an oddly lurching bass and guitar motif, keyboards, and a singer with only a vague acquaintance with pitch (but probably a stronger acquaintance with the Promise Ring's recordings) into the appealing if off-center melodicism of "Clear Story Windows." "Road to Nowhere" by the Emotional Strain is marked out by its muttered vocals and abraded guitars, while Proudentall's "La Prima Concion" gives us four minutes of shifting instrumental rhythms, nearly math-like but less taut and rigid, and concludes with a handful of shouted lyrics in its last half-minute. Pollen's "Artichoke Heart" is produced by Bill Stephenson (Descendents, All) and sounds like it. Sounding closer to the album's musical center, Sunday's Best tries for the majesty of Sunny Day Real Estate's more mysterious moments and nearly achieves it in "Luxury of Light." If the point of the compilation's title is that merely achieving an evocative style isn't sufficient, more than half the songs here do add an indefinable something to raise themselves above the average.

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