+/-

Self-Titled Long-Playing Debut Album (Teen Beat)
by Tim Den

Can the members of Versus do no wrong? Apparently not! +/- is Versus guitarist James Baluyut’s “solo project”: A bedroom recording with fuzzy breakbeats and dizzying falsettos, chamber pop melodies and vocal harmonies to match. Airy one moment, explosive the next, Baluyut post-modernizes folky acoustic guitar passages with jilted rhythms to create an indielectronica daydream. Can you bust a move to soothing ambience? Can you snuggle up to jabbing drum’n’bass? You can if it’s +/-. A precious, delicate ass-and-heart mover this is… not to mention one helluva debut.
(PO Box 3265 Arlington, VA 22203)