Remember Low? The band that defined the meaning of playing with hushed, somber introspection, and gained popularity in the mid to late 90′s? Well, the dude from Low, Alan Sparhawk, has a new project, Retribution Gospel Choir, and loud is his new quiet. The band’s second album, appropriately titled “2″, suggests that Sparhawk has followed a similar trajectory in his playing that I have in my listening, which is to say that he’s gone from a mid-90′s mope to a late-aughts loudness colored with nostalgia. My nostalgic leanings have taken me backwards through my early twenties grunge era, past the metal-mania years of my teens, and all the way to the 70′s classic rock that my brother raised me on, meaning that lately my turntable has been spinning things like Blue Oyster Cult, Boston and REO Speedwagon. That’s right, REO Speedwagon. “You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can’t Tuna Fish,” motherfucker!

Anyway, along comes Retribution Gospel Choir, sounding like REO raised in the 80′s underground, or an indie-rock Blue Oyster Cult–I’m talking “more cowbell” B.O.C. here, which to some folks is a brooding, balladeering crime against the motor-boogie mayhem of earlier B.O.C., but fuck it, I like it. And my guess is, so does Alan Sparhawk and choir, as they pay some serious retribution to it with “2″–the Low hush is gone, but the somber introspection remains. Check it out:

It’s out now from Sub Pop. Get a digital version at LaLa (above) or any number of other sites. 

Or you can always pick up a copy at your local record store.