This came out in 2003 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
Retro-power poppers Telepathic Butterflies borrowed their name — not to mention the cover art of their self-titled album — from Kurt Vonnegut’s Breakfast of Champions. So we know they can read. This is good.
And on these 16 songs, they borrowed bits of the sound from the likes of The Beatles, Big Star, Teenage Fanclub, Matthew Sweet, The Kinks and much of the Elephant 6 roster. So we also know they have good taste and cool record collections. This is even better. But what really seals the deal — and, one would suspect, helped seal their deal with cool indie label Rainbow Quartz — is that whatever they borrow, they pay back with interest. Recorded at home over the past few years, Telepathic Butterflies is an outstanding slate of expertly crafted, solidly performed, craftily arranged and superbly self-produced power-pop jewels that condense the late ’60s and early ’70s down to an hour’s worth of sharply gleaming hooks, high-angle vocals and British Invasion tunesmithery so sublime it oughta make Robert Pollard jealous. This shows they can write. And that’s what’s best of all.
