The first thing the listener will notice about RICKED WICKY is that it is the most musically adept project GUIDED BY VOICES' mage ROBERT POLLARD has undertaken in some time, at least since late period-GBV (Half-Smiles of the Decomposed, for instance), or even BOSTON SPACESHIPS. "[Ricked Wicky] is a sophisticated arena rock band," says Pollard, and I Sell the Circus offers in evidence a series of ball-peen hammers to the brain-pan ("Piss Face" with its James Gang-era slide guitar and the proto-punk stomp of "Intellectual Types," for example) alongside more delicate, prog-tinged Frippery ("Cow-Headed Moon" features Court of the Crimson King-esque mellotron, while the acoustic guitar mastery displayed on "Even Today and Tomorrow" recalls the mellow-era ELP of "Lucky Man"). Credit the players: bolstering the easy mastery of a dizzying array of songwriting forms one naturally expects (and receives) from Pollard are the impressive instrumental prowess of fellow Daytonian NICK MITCHELL, TODD TOBIAS and KEVIN MARCH. Fourteen of its fifteen tracks were recorded at Cyberteknics in Dayton, a studio Pollard has come to use with increasing frequency due to its profusion of vintage analog gear.