With all the hype around and their "gay church music," you'd think they were the second coming. Unlike their influences, such as and , who usually couch the nitty-gritty details of lust and sex in witty metaphors or avoid them altogether, and company not only celebrate sex and its accompanying smells and stains, but inflate them to divine status on their second album, . This is a worthy accomplishment -- too much is notoriously phobic when it comes to singing about sex of any kind -- but it seems to be the main thing that differentiates from the many other bands that use not only , but , , and other purveyors of cleverly written as touchstones. That's on record, at least; ' legendary, theatrical performances -- which have been held in churches and adult theaters alike and feature strippers, films, and dancing galore -- would doubtlessly make the songs on that much more technicolor-brilliant. Stripped of that context, the album almost sounds like an original cast recording of a -- the next best thing to being there, but not the same by a long shot. The album's best songs, such as a subversively witty retort to the seemingly endless legal battles surrounding gay marriages and an exploration of how pointless marriage is in general, have enough substance on their own to make the transition from live spectacle to single relatively intact. Likewise, the triumphantly fey capture the smutty idealism that's at the heart of ' agenda. However, most of is just pleasant, sunny ; even with lyrics as sexually free-thinking as ' "Happiness has a smell I inhale like a drug done in a darkened hall or a bathroom stall with a friend or a man with a hard-on," and not one but two songs about water sports, the music is still overwhelmingly traditional. This album brings back music's libido, which is certainly worth something; it's also possible that if ' music sounded as radical as its lyrics are, it wouldn't be nearly as well-received. Ultimately is a very good, but not great, album. Perhaps next time will go all the way -- so to speak -- and deliver something that's equally forward-thinking in its sexuality and its sound. ~ Heather Phares