Building on the dusty country and garage inflected indie-rock of their past releases, Half Stack’s “Sitting Pretty” thrums with an expansive energy, adding optimistic songwriting and power-pop melodies to the mix. The band tracked the album with Mac Demarco collaborator Joe Santarpia, pairing locomotive rhythms and jauntily affable lyrics with their trademark whiskey-soaked spin on DIY rock, recalling artists like Tiger Trap, The Silver Jews, and “American Beauty” era Grateful Dead. Whereas singer/guitarist Peter Kegler took the lead as songwriter on previous Half Stack records, this time around he passed the mic to singer/guitarist Marley Lix-Jones for a number of tracks; The impact of her songwriting shines through across the varied tracklist, and is especially gripping on the swaggering “New Light” and psychedelic rocker “TOTM3”. Meanwhile, album opener “I Might Try” starts off strong with its vocal harmonies and soaring lead guitar; “Burnt” pairs honky-tonk rhythms with power-pop melodies; and “Diamond Dancer'' riffs on psych-rock with duelling harmonized guitars. The scope and variety of sound represented on “Sitting 3 Pretty” cements its place as Half Stack’s most wonderfully unpredictable and ambitious outing to date
