With ragged voice and ragged heart, Rhode Island’s Deer Tick seeped into the sub-American subconscious one embraceable, perplexing album at a time. That singer-songwriter John J. McCauley cheated on the heavy rock he grew up on when romanced by the music of Hank Williams explains a lot about the band’s sound(s), even its penchant for eschewing twang (they brag about that) for grit and grace. Maybe that’s why sometimes they sound like The Jayhawks after being sucked into life’s existential jet engine, with all those gorgeous harmonies shredded and replaced by guitar licks trailing in the dirt like a seatbelt dragging from a stolen truck’s door, and other times they sound like, well, like Deer Tick on a bender swerving home from a Stooges concert with Exile on Main Street cranked on the stereo and cigarette ash setting the upholstery on fire.

That would be enough, but their mythology expands every time they play an entire set of Nirvana covers as Deervana, or toss in some Replacements or John Prine, or flip between punk-trammeled rock and sparse-sky roots with the casual aplomb of a kid choosing chocolate milk or white. Add their storied rambunctious live shows, and Deer Tick is the soundtrack for anyone who’s ever driven the off-ramp from the endless masquerade.

— Mary-Lynn Wardle