Foxy Shazam (Deluxe Version)

The joyfully overblown music of Foxy Shazam scales heights of pomp-rock excess rarely ascended since the heyday of Queen. On their self-titled major label debut, the Cincinnati-based quintet constructs tunes heavy on bone-shaking beats, florid guitar licks and flashy keyboard tickling. Singer Eric Nally fully embraces the Freddie Mercury school of operatic projection, with hints of Dee Snider-style hysteria thrown in. Clearly, the spirit of Queen hovers over such brazen effusions as “Oh Lord,” “Unstoppable” and “The Only Way to My Heart…” But Nally and his crew have found new ways to tease and tweak their listeners as well — “Wanna-Be Angel,” for instance, is a personal manifesto of defiance addressed to the tastemakers of the current rock scene. “Bye Bye Symphony” captures Foxy Shazam at their most expansive, packing in a suite’s worth of ideas into 4:04 minutes. “Evil Thoughts” allows Nally an extended moment of faux-confession over pianist Sky White’s piano flourishes. The manic enthusiasm of the group transforms their songs from clever pastiches into irresistible entertainment.