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October 9, 2009 - The first track from Monsters of Folk's debut album starts with a whisper: delicate harp glissandos, pitter-pattering electro drums, swooning strings and high, keening falsetto vocals. It's a lovely beginning for this indie-rock supergroup, which features big shots like My Morning Jacket's Jim James, singer-songwriter M. Ward and Bright Eyes' Conor Oberst and Mike Mogis. It's also remarkably unassuming and restrained: With so many egos in the room, it's a relief that they didn't end up with a thick, goopy stew of a song.

But that's what makes Monsters of Folk's debut a triumph: It's just a few songwriting aces, kicking around ideas and coming up with killer pop tunes. "Dear God (Sincerely M.O.F.)" functions as the band's calling card: a ghostly, reverb-soaked ballad in which the three chief singers (James, Ward and Oberst; Mogis mostly provides elegant, spare instrumentation) take turns expounding on the human race's relationship with you-know-who. Perhaps not surprisingly, Oberst — the most philosophical and brooding of the bunch — delivers the winning lines: "Dear God," he sings in his cracked croon. "I wish that I could touch you Sometimes I feel I almost do / And then I'm behind the glass again / Oh, God, what keeps you out, it keeps me in."

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