Volunteers

If a picture truly is worth a thousand words, the cover of Volunteers' self-titled debut album — an image of a Hammond organ set ablaze — tells a story all by itself. Musically, of course, the organ is the cornerstone of the Lawrence foursome's increasingly popular live show. It's no slouch on CD, either. With the assistance of some other eclectic instrumentation (cello, bass fiddle, pedal steel guitar, trumpet), the band breathes fire into the well-intentioned but occasionally shoe-gazing world of indie folk. Tracks such as the jazzed-up "American Picture Star" or the dressed-down "Cool Kid" make you wonder what Wilco might sound like if Jeff Tweedy could just relax a little bit. But it's those flames, billowing forth from a staple of the sleeper-rock subset, that give credence to the band's disregard for genre prerequisites by way of unexpected guitar solos and candid vocals. For the sake of future albums, let's just hope those flames were Photoshopped.