**1/2 Live

THE DISTANCE TO HERE

(Radioactive)

Live's next slab of platinum sounds like their preceding mega-sellers Secret Samadhi and Throwing Copper. Spiritual imagery and self-affirmations abound; so do the usual clichés -- phoenixes rise and rivers rage. The snare-and-kick drums rattle like tanks advancing on the big guitar chords. Frontman Ed Kowalczyk's voice rises in tremulous, overwrought bellows of insight as he plays visionary.

That said, there's something undeniably appealing about the way they wear their hearts, pacifism, and utopian ideals on their brown deliveryman's uniforms. Not just in the single "The Dolphin's Cry" (where Ed observes that, "Life is like a shooting star/It don't matter who you are"), but elsewhere. Maybe it's because no matter how obvious their revelations are, they're unremittingly positive. Maybe it's the passion Kowalczyk always invests in his soaring tenor, which is full of curlicues of phrase and dynamics. Or maybe it's the simplicity of their music, which makes every detail of Live's sound and songwriting plainly accessible. Yeah, that's it: Live's gift is a tuneful, refreshing lack of irony.

-- Ted Drozdowski