Being Matt Ward must be tough. Sure, there are the critical accolades, the touring with Jim James and Conor Oberst and the inevitable indie rock groupies, but then you’ve got to earn your keep. Something that can get especially tricky when your last album happened to be good, and if you’re M. Ward, your last album was pretty phenomenal. 2003's Transfiguration of Vincent was a gorgeous little gem of melancholic, Beatles-inflected folkish pop that catapulted him toward the elite line of his crowded-bandwagon of a genre. Which is why it's a disappointing shock that his new effort, Transistor Radio, is unfocused, haphazard, and a bit homogenous.

I have a feeling this would be more excusable if this wasn’t coming after Transfiguration; in many ways, Radio is faithful to Ward’s a-bit-too-dull 2001 release, End of Amnesia. Sonically, all three records are playing the same game: Ward’s vocals are fantastic (his voice is not one to elicit much controversy, worn as it may sound), quietly strummed acoustic guitar, and as much fuzz and atmosphere as Ward can be bothered to smother himself in. Transistor sets out to capture the sort of A.M. radio world that Ward grew up with (tellingly, he also insists it needs to be heard one side at a time, as if two seperate records... but not), but in the end this seems to hurt more than help. Ward excelled on the most crisp, bright songs on Transfiguration (especially the one-two punch of “Vincent O’Brien” and “Sad, Sad Song”), but nothing here manages to live up to that level of songsmanship.

Which isn’t to say that there’s nothing worth listening to here, of course. Ward seems to have gotten past his Vincent O’Brien phase (the story, as I’ve heard it, involves his friend dying and him writing Transfiguration as a requiem to him). Both his previous albums featured songs about O’Brien, and though it can be argued that the pretty, instrumental “Regeneration No. 1” is a continuation of his transfiguration themes, the album generally has a somewhat more positive, albeit dark, feel about it.

Whereas Transfiguration immediately hooked the listener (even with the usual instrumental opener), Radio opens with a decent instrumental Beach Boys cover and the hazy, indistinct “One Life Away” featuring My Morning Jacket's Jim James, which could be far more propulsive if the breakdown wasn’t so quiet and swaddled in fuzz. “Sweethearts on Parade” seems like a chorus in search of a verse, but “Hi-Fi” is more fully developed and has a playful little hook buried in the warbled refrain. Likewise, “Fuel for Fire” is well fleshed-out, but it’s also ultimately forgettable. Starting to see a trend yet?

If not, I'll continue: “Four Hours in Washington” and “Big Boat” feel like something off Transfiguration, but decidely watered down. “Radio Campaign” and “Paul’s Song” both do reasonably well on their own, but then along comes “Here Comes the Sun Again," which is far too hokey to leave any lasting impression. Sure, we get a few silver linings (most notably “Oh Take me Back," probably the album’s most sincere and well-delivered track; it succeeds wildly where tracks like the striped-down “I’ll Be Yr Bird” feels contrived), but the momentum is consistently stunted --- something which, when dealing with a talent like this, can be incredibly frustrating. Repeated listens begin to unravel small segments of each track that make the intial disappointment lessen, but not nearly enough; without anything making Radio a step forward in either style or quality, you'd have to be awfully forgiving to hear an album even on par with Vincent, let alone its better.

Basically, Transistor Radio fails through never really trying. On Transfiguration of Vincent, Ward was willing to warp his style, experiment with his sound, and when he bothered to include a cover, it was a very welcome surprise. Here he just seems stuck --- maintaining what he seems to think works best, but without trying to color outside his own lines. End of Amnesia didn’t do so well because of this (even before he'd proven himself of better, which lends it some leeway), and it seems likely that Radio will be easily forgotten for the same reasons. It’s a shame, but proves once again that a good voice and solid instrumentation isn’t enough to make an album. The inexcusable bit is that Ward already knew this; hopefully he remembers for the next album.