Back in 2009, Fol Chen came out of Los Angeles armed with colorful rhythms and masked as if they were trying to steal your cookie crisp. The sextet smeared black paint across their eyes before video shoots and stage shows in order to hide their identity, and somehow still remain relatively anonymous to the public; a trait that can become irritating if you’re attempting to deliver some correspondence about the group. But, I’m sure that’s why they did it, and they’re now doing it again with the release of their second LP off of Asthmatic Kitty, Part II: The New December, which recalls the same awkward rhythms and dismal dream melodies as their first installment.

The adventure begins with “The Holograms” a melodic bloodbath of guitar plucking, heavy drums, and blown gaskets, that blows us right into the single “In Ruins,” which follows the same recipe as the former except this time with more sass provided by the vocals of Karin Tatoyan.

The remaining eight tracks follow a similar blueprint. For the most part it sounds as though Fol Chen has left their tape recorder in a factory and developed music out of what they’ve collected. Which raises the question: is that a bad thing? This brings us to the answer: not all the time. They can be faulted for losing control of the pace in tracks like, “Adeline,” which is a splatter house of sound, and “C/U,” which is reminiscent to some Discovery B side from last summer. Then, within the final four tracks they pull a complete 180 and mix it up, by well, not mixing it up as much. With the songs, “The Holes,” and the title track, “The New December,” were are given slow summer day tunes that trade in the beat machines and hand claps for harps and harmonics which bring the album out in the opposite direction that it came in.

This could be described as well rounded, but I wouldn’t go that far. It feels more like Fol Chen has tried to create something that doesn’t really mesh well together as a whole, while each individual song is molded from contradicting sounds themselves resulting in several successes. It’s a bit ironic, and a bit confusing, maybe that’s why they choose to keep their true faces hidden. Still, try to look past the masks, and Fol Chen’s slightly irritating need to be left unknown and realize they’ve put out a twerky version of an old pop sound, which forces you to forget that you never really knew who they were in the first place.