*** Sportsguitar

HAPPY ALREADY

(Matador)

The fun of Switzerland's Sportsguitar -- aside from the gooey melodies and shambling amateurism -- is hearing familiar echoes ricocheting around inside your head, like the hazy riff that opens "Romeo Goes" and sounds as if had been copped from, of all people, the Faces. On the duo's third disc, songwriter Oliver Obert sings as if he were still mastering the English language, and if the result sometimes comes off as little awkward, a little unsure, well, it suits the spirit of the music. Sportsguitar teeter on the precipice of hope and hopelessness at all times. "Come Home" is a poignant grabbing at straws; "Fish" is suffused in simple, universal longing. Obert makes like a less verbose Steve Malkmus on "Mistake," a ditty about drinking away the lingering memory of an unfaithful lover, reassuring yourself that the relationship wasn't worth the trouble anyway -- and feeling your heart break into a million pieces.

-- Jonathan Perry