Axis of Evol (2006) Axis ' cover art, pink rosebuds and black-eyed skeletons, gets at Vancouver singer-songwriter Stephen McBean's duality just right. The CD's bookends — "Comas" and "How… Pink Mountaintops Rock
EW's GRADE
B

Details Release Date: Mar 07, 2006; Lead Performance: Pink Mountaintops; Genre: Rock

Axis' cover art, pink rosebuds and black-eyed skeletons, gets at Vancouver singer-songwriter Stephen McBean's duality just right. The CD's bookends — ''Comas'' and ''How We Can Get Free'' — are haunting country-psych ballads; ''New Drugs'' and ''Lord Let Us Shine'' go for the fuzzy floor stomping of early Beck. He's a man taken with strange angles; Evol is just love spelled backward. B

Originally posted Mar 03, 2006 Published in issue #867 Mar 10, 2006 Order article reprints