***Second Base is San Francisco’s T.I.T.S.’ sophomore release, following on from their split album debut with Leopard Leg. It's an album that draws similarly from metal and doom, but in which individual songs are stripped down to an icy core. Chanted vocals, sparse, jarring guitars and a drum-centric focus all lend to a compelling sense of drama and impending ruin. Tracks like "Childs" and "Octopus" certainly show how the band's sound has moved on from their first record, not afraid to push the songs to the end of the road and into oblivion. There's also a greater use of cyclical narratives both in the group vocals and song structures shown best with "Void," which seems to draw on a compulsion to unlock the hypnotic and instinctual. Songs move into and out of chaos, regimented rhythms collapsing into squally feedback like a '60s freakout taken to almost parodic extremes. (STREET DATE - 6/23/2009)