Sebadoh Polishes Its Act Without Harming Image

SEBADOH

“Harmacy”

Sub Pop

* * * 1/2

Indie rock’s own Hamlet, Lou Barlow has made a career of being caught between a rock and a hard place. His fractured ballads feel as if they were popped off with barely a thought, but they walk a tightrope over epic obsessions.

“I don’t think before I speak, and I don’t know how far my words reach,” Barlow broods in “On Fire,” the opening track of his band’s eighth album. Considering Sebadoh’s high-squall, off-kilter ethic, pretty far. Since Barlow split from Dinosaur Jr. in 1989, he has spawned a surprise indie hit with his offshoot band Folk Implosion (noted for its contribution to the “Kids” soundtrack) and become low-fi rock’s most relentless--and highest-profile--self-analyst.

Perhaps prodded by the success of 1994’s “Bakesale,” “Harmacy” is the band’s most accessible album to date, thrilling for Barlow’s emotional spelunking and drummer Bob Fay and bassist Jason Loewenstein’s musical daring. Sebadoh still retains an entirely subversive approach to pop.

Barlow’s direct songs are purely stunning: “On Fire” and “Willing to Wait” are minimal, edgy folk gems that practically sigh with uneasiness, and “Perfect Way” is a plodding musical jingle that puts everything at stake in its words. Loewenstein, the group’s punkier voice, gains confidence as a writer, spewing out funny, caustic anthems such as “I Love to Fight.” Except for a couple of instrumentals that feel like padding, “Harmacy” shows the entire band (which plays Sept. 18-19 at the Roxy) matching Barlow’s most artistic masterstrokes.

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