In other places, the full-bodied, up-tempo sound that the Fairies bring to the mix makes proceedings feel like an outright party; fun and imaginative, the likes of "I Feel Like a Child" and "Chinese Children" are indicative of a new direction Banhart is intent on exploring, "Space Reggae" - folk you can dance to. Similarly, while light-hearted musings "The Beatles" and "Dragonflies" catch Banhart and company making brief but quirky stopovers mid-way through, "Little Boys," on the other hand, is thoroughly tongue in cheek. With the help of Georgeson's lead guitar (which, throughout the album, has lent some fine slides and subtle fret-work), Banhart embarks on a soulful dose of throaty crooning on the subject of a schizophrenic hermaphrodite. Although it all sounds slightly out of character, half-way in, a bass-line inspired by the old soul classic "I Will Follow Him" (made famous by Little Peggy March) arrives, bringing with it Cripple Crow's second foray into doo-wop while dropping the eyebrow-raising lines "I see so many...little boys I want to marry," perhaps intentionally ensuring that the album will never be played publicly in certain corporate chains. The album's closing number, "Woman," a solo affair quietly played out on the piano and feeling almost elegiac in tone, brings things to a halt like an eloquent after-thought, a romantic full-stop on an album that sounds like the recording process was one to remember.

With any change in sound, for every new listener won over, there will inevitably be a string of nay-sayers among the artist's die-hard contingent. There will also be those that will find a way to take exception with the overtly hippie undertones, but any such cry of "selling out" here is assuredly misplaced. As a fan of his earlier work, to these ears, Cripple Crow - with highlights aplenty - marks a welcome change in Banhart's sound. There were moments on his previous two albums where the songs were just calling out to have a band behind them, and as if to over-compensate for that hindrance, not only has Banhart formed the Hairy Fairies, but the arrangements for the twenty-two tracks are as assorted as the album's Sgt. Pepper's-esque cover. Cripple Crow sees Banhart avoiding the risk of letting such creativity grow stale by refusing to limit himself to one single sound, reinvigorating his unique and inventive song-writing in the process. Let's hope the rumours that the Venezuela-raised hipster is considering a retirement from making albums are unfounded, and that he keeps his impressive productivity levels up until he's a grey haired nomad with a hundred eccentric gems in his back-catalogue...after all, he's only just begun to make us dance.

See What You Hear.com
(Also contains recent live reviews of Devendra Banhart)