If we were Jose Gonzalez, we'd probably get tired of all the bell-ends throwing coloured balls at our face and adopt a different guise 'n' all. While that's probably not the reason the troubadour formed Junip, it's certainly a good enough reason to take him away from the acoustic melancholia that soundtracks car ads.
Junip's self-titled second album veers a little bit further into shoegaze territory, but remaining fully accessible. Line of Fire is a crackling opener, an absolute force of fuzz and melody that rides on Gonzalez's inimitable vocal. In fact, most of the album lives on that voice - it's hard to imagine any other singer-songwriter lending more pathos to songs such as Head First or After All is Said and Done.
Where there might have once been a worry that Gonzalez and Junip could have ventured into MOR, Radio 2 territory, there's certainly no danger of that here. This eponymous second album is exciting enough without being prohibitive, simple but discernibly jagged just like its cover. Buy it.