Larry and His Flask / By the Lamplight

Listening to a Larry and His Flask album is a lot like staring at a jar of paint. You can admire the color, you can even imagine what it’d look like on a canvas. But paint isn’t meant to be observed in a controlled environment. It’s just a tool to create something dynamic. What I’m saying is, the band is a spectacle.

Larry and His Flask are a raucous good time, for sure. Anyone who has ever seen them live can attest to that. Imagine Mumford and Sons but grimier and without the pretentious Grammy-pandering bullshit. Six dudes just beating the living hell out of their instruments. The bass player treats his upright bass as if the thing insulted his mother. He abuses his instrument harder than a teenage boy with an Internet connection and the house to himself.

If you’d like an idea of how out-of-control they are: I have a friend whose band has toured with the Flask. When the tour came through his town, he let the band sleep on his living room floor but he refused to go to sleep before they did. He didn’t trust six grown men in his own house. Because you never know what kind of hell Larry and His Flask are gonna raise.

So that’s the kind of band we’re dealing with. That’s why it’s so weird to sit down at your desk, put your headphones in, and listen to By the Lamplight. Don’t get me wrong, the album sounds terrific, without question, and is a perfect sequel to 2011’s All That We Know. It brilliantly combined elements of punk, folk, and bluegrass with ridiculous harmonies and plucking of banjos, guitars, and just about any other makeshift instrument with a string on it. If the album sounds like you’re listening to a bunch of smelly dudes busking on a street corner, it’s because you are. That probably explains the choice to include a cameo by Ms. Jenny Owen Youngs who breaks up the Flask dudefest 10 minutes into the album.

By the Lamplight is an incredibly fun album. But if you want to truly experience the Flask, catch them on tour. Just don’t let them sleep on your floor.

• reviewed by Dan Ozzi