Orange Cake Mix
's
Jim Rao
could be accused of making the same album over and over again, alternating between gauzy guitar strumming and Casio noodling with fey, reverby vocals on top.
Silver Lining Underwater
breaks with tradition and eliminates the latter, leaving an
instrumental
album that is more
ambient
and less rhythmic than
OCM
's other efforts, but built from the same materials. The album, while pleasant, leaves one with the feeling that anyone possessing basic competence on a handful of instruments could achieve a similar result. Serious consumers of
Rao
's prolific output might enjoy
as background music, but it is otherwise the
indie pop
counterpart to those anonymous mood music CDs you might find in a grocery store bargain bin. ~ Greg Adams