Echo & the Bunnymen's famed singer, Ian McCulloch, always sounds as if he's engaged in nothing more laborious than lying back on a chaise lounge. Animated he is not.

McCulloch has never been a whirling dervish as far as singers go, and "SuperMellowMan," off his Liverpudlian band's latest release, Flowers, is about waiting for your destiny; but gone are the days when he and bandmate Will Sergeant wrote and played fitful snarls of angst-driven rock that may not have featured the most thoughtful of lyrics, but still sounded invigorating and important nonetheless.

Released back in April and touted as a return to songwriting standards set by the band's abrasive 1981 release Heaven up Here, Flowers falls in line with the low-key, latter-day Echo & the Bunnymen release What Are You Going to Do With Your Life?--a lush but ultimately lackluster attempt to show the band as a mature act while asking tough, autobiographical questions on the nature of stardom.

Though Crocodiles is generally agreed upon to be Echo & the Bunnymen's best album, Heaven up Here was their most strident. Sergeant's urgency permeates the record, especially on songs like "Over the Wall" and "A Promise," and McCulloch sounds nearly hysterical throughout much of the album. Flowers, on the other hand, is a purely mellow affair, with Sergeant's inventive guitar-playing against McCulloch's famously resonant vocals--a mere epilogue to the story of a singular band. A better purchase for diehard fans and those just curious would be the forthcoming 72-track retrospective, Crystal Days 1979-1999, a four-CD set spanning the band's career between '79 and '99 that includes 17 previously unreleased tracks as well as 21 that haven't, until now, been available on CD.

In the '80s, Echo & the Bunnymen could be counted upon to stage elaborately dressed live shows, and their most recent Seattle dates have held up to that reputation. Given the Showbox's nostalgic ambiance and unmatched sound system and McCulloch's golden voice, this band and venue were made for each other.