The Besnyo crew almost sound like they’ve been in a laboratory using precise measurements and scientific knowhow to concoct Worry. Just the right measurements of feedback here, dropping the correct tonnage of echo on the scales right over there, and waiting for the chemical reaction of combining whirring synths with cascading drums. Worry is a ballet of beautiful collisions, a mesh of finely tuned textures. Everything New Wave is new again. You can spot the influences at work here: Jesus and Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine have left imprints on Worry’s respective dark and cold versus warm, omni-directional psychedelia and feedback. “I Blame You For Everything” has a hazey but thundering Stone Roses touch. “Olympic” has insatiable pop savvy, grabbing the rushing, rhythmic grace of Joy Divison while Sean Mikula’s hushed pining sounds like a whispering Robert Smith. Besnyo, however, ably sidestep a simple retreading of post-punk constraints, and Worry presses ahead with its own personality. The canned drum machine claps belie a deeper, majestic balladry on “Blankets” while the title track flirts with avant jazz. Moving beyond the intricate layers of sound, the strength of Besnyo’s songs further takes them over a new threshold. Besnyo achieves finely structured compositions here, moving far beyond the sound collaging of their first album. Co-producer and studio wiz Mark Nosowicz is deserving of some of the praise here, too. His years of toiling in the rural Southtowns barn-turned-studio have reached summation here. Worry is a chillingly refreshing record of stripped but spiky, postmodern dream rock and grandiose, anthemic, orchestral pop. It stands arguably as the finest—the most complete and satisfying—album yet to rise from Buffalo’s Harvest Sum collective of bands.

When Mark Olson exited the Jayhawks, he not only left musical partner Gary Louris to realign the beloved Minneapolis country-rockers but left fans missing the tenor harmonies the pair conjured. Olson’s rich, reedy tone and Louris’ sparkling, warm and honeyed lilt remain unmatched in recent music. One of the many wonderful things about 2007’s Olson’s The Salvation Blues is the return of the Olson and Louris’ harmonies; the two began touring together the year before and then began participating in each other’s recordings. This is certainly no Jayhawks record, however. With the disc housed in a mock hardcover book, it is a pure statement from Olson that finds him taking stock of life while wrapped in love’s dissolution. The Salvation Blues is a sad, contemplative collection of songs tied together in a pervasive setting of drifting, desert lonesomeness and sorrow. There are moments—like the vintage Jayhawks-style number “Poor Michael’s Boat”—where the sunshine reigns. Largely, however, this painful and painstakingly crafted collection of gorgeous songs folds to the loss of warmth. The somber “Sandy Denny” is more than a paen to the English folkie. With lines like “Things we dislike in others we find in ourselves/Summer left us with one” it’s hard not hard to find the traces of Olson’s crumbled marriage with singer Victoria Williams. Similarly, the lovely, regret-laden closer “My One Book Philosophy” suggests “a honeymoon no more” to a spare electric Wurlitzer. It’s the epilogue of The Salvation Blues and the best way to sum it all up, sort of a “Buckets of Rain” at the end of Olson’s own Blood on the Tracks.