THE MARS VOLTA Octahedron (2009 UK 8-track CD album - An album heady with the emotion and high-drama that has always been the band's trademark, 'Octahedron' opens with the tender ache of 'Since We've Been Wrong', Cedric's keening vocal establishing a mood that's deeply blue, powerfully melancholic, a suckerpunch that hits every bit as hard as Octahedron's unashamed rockers [the gleaming futuristic funk of 'Teflon,' the tense chase-music of 'Cotopaxi']. Pulling back from the full-tilt experimentation of previous releases, the album invests its energies in Omar's gift for songcraft, for swooning guitar runs of high tension and emotive power ['Luciforms'], and for the nagging hooks and melodies that wreath the churning rhythms of 'Desperate Graves')