Future Clouds and Radar

After 2007’s eponymous double album, you’d think Future Clouds & Radar’s Robert Harrison would be out of things to say. Think again. With Peoria, Harrison goes in a new direction, but not so far adrift that it’s unfamiliar. There’s still the catchy hooks, driving guitars and Lennonesque vocals, but now they’re delivered in a larger-than-life, cinematic presentation. Even though there’s an overriding dark theme of futility and mortality, there’s also a carnival-funhouse feel, looking at things in different perspectives and scales, with lots of surprises. “Epcot View” opens the album like a typical pop tune, but shifts to a funky guitar break and effects in the middle. “Old Edmund Ruffin” gets a symphonic touch with Hollie Thomas’s synth stylings before sailing out on a guitar riff that seamlessly transitions to the determined keyboards and percussion of “Feet on Grass.” But that’s just the first course. The fun really begins with the epic-length, mostly instrumental “Mummified” and “Eighteen Months,” which rocks with a brilliant guitar solo at the end, partially obscured by a horn section and hand claps. Peoria infuses a shot of creative genius/mad scientist into an often-derivative musical landscape. It’s a soundtrack just waiting for a movie to be made around it — something French and avant-garde, but set in the future.