**** Toad the Wet Sprocket

COIL

(Columbia)

In the early 1990s, as Lollapalooza spread punk-powered alternative rock and $30 T-shirts across America, Toad the Wet Sprocket were still doing the grassroots thing. Supporting their stellar Bread and Circus (1989) and Pale (1990) records, the band packed college bars and concert halls. A half-decade later, artists like Live and the Dave Matthews Band now embody the acoustic alternative, and Toad are at a crossroads.

Unfortunately, Coil, the product of a two-year hiatus, offers little progress from their last album, the mediocre Dulcinea. Although vocalist Glen Phillips still boasts golden pipes, the Toad formula has grown tired. "Rings" sounds like a collection of stolen Smithereens tunes slapped into a weak array of repetitious guitar chords, overdubbed vocal tracks and snippy percussion. "All Things in Time" is a sweet ballad, but it feels strangely like Toad's own "I Will Not Take These Things for Granted." "Come Down," the atypical Toad single and Coil's best moment, mingles high-chord guitar chops with Phillips's raspy yelps. But that's the second track on the album, and it's all downhill from there.

-- Jonathan Vena