Mike Downey

Acoustic indie-rock plaints of this nature are a dime a dozen, yearning, spare, and incidentally pedestrian. Like Downey's other lovesick inanities, "Flame Out Flyboy" almost begs for grit and gravitas — amniotic no-fi, sullen vocals, bleeding amps — the stranded-in-a-cave style Robert Pollard adopted for those late-Nineties solo masterpieces that no one talks about anymore. But Pollard has too much of his own work waiting in the wings already, so we're sorta stuck, metaphorically, where Downey starts off here: "I'm at the 7-Eleven/Debating breakfast in tinfoil."