Meat Puppets

Long regarded as lucky metalheads with a psychedelic soul (after all, Kurt Cobain invited them to perform on Nirvana's MTV Unplugged session), the Meat Puppets have since outgrown most former labels. The band's new album, Rise to Your Knees, adds half-country harmonizing to the drawn-out, effects-pedal-distorted fuzzy sound found on albums past (perhaps because co-founders/brothers Curt and Cris Kirkwood now call Austin, Texas, home). Other tunes are a throwback to the apex of classic rock and often conjure the jangly alt-rock of Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers. Knees proves that the Meat Puppets have become more than just a band only patient experimental-music lovers could love.