Marshan is from Glasgow, Scotland. One of my friends from New Jersey went to Glasgow recently. I asked him what Glasgow was like. He said it was like New Jersey. I thought that was kind of funny.

Marshan melds the wonderful production of Dave Chang (to me, Dave is the man every band should hire as producer) with sonics reminiscent of Welsh pot-princes Acrimony. In fact vocalist ...or in this case one of the vocalists, there seems to be two....sounds eerily like Acrimony's Dorian Walters with maybe a little of the late Shannon Hoon in the mix. Crazy.

Where I found Acrimony a little stale with a one-size-fits-all approach, Marshan liven things up with toe tappers, head bangers and a cool, little hypnotic ballad. In fact the sparse, mostly acoustic driven "Deep and Meaningless" is one of my favorite cuts off of the album. It starts off slow and builds into a jumbilia of bass, drums, guitar and vocals. Kind of like if the Grateful Dead got a kick in the ass during the last part of a "I Know you Ryder/China Cat Sunflower" jam. I'll also say that if you juxtapose "Deep and Meaningless" with the happy little butt-shaker that is "Mutton Chop Hop" you'll get the full Marshan vibe. This is one band that knows how to write a song and sound like they are having a good time doing it.

They kept this album tight, no filler added, with six tracks clocking in at just over a half-hour. Despite the tough subject matter of songs like "Needle Eye" (which grooves like an electric router!) it's a half-hour of feeling like you've landed in Marshan happy land, where the drinking fountains serve Schnapps, the trees are made of Godiva, the flowers are lollipops and the sun never sets. You just don't want to leave.