“The band has always been more than our individual egos; we’re no less the Secret Machines now than we’ve ever been,” says singer/bassist/keyboardist Brandon Curtis. When his brother, guitarist/vocalist Ben Curtis, left the band to focus on his band School of Seven Bells in early 2007, Brandon and drummer Josh Garza knew this didn’t mean the end. The energy and emotion that the Secret Machines fans responded to over the last decade, and continue to seek, was intact. Rather than pull the plug, they carried on with their towering third album, Secret Machines. Secret Machines also marks the first record on which the same core musicians were used throughout the entire process, from the earliest demos to the final master. The continuity shows in the final results, in the expansive instrumental swells, in the hooks and phrasing, in the tracking itself. Opening with the disaffected, futuristic verse-chorus “Atomic Heels,” the Secret Machines embark on a journey where their appreciation for the Beatles, Zeppelin, and Krautrock is clear but not derivative or bromidic — and they crank up the volume. It’s music played for the love of music, songs sung for the love of singing, nothing more, and definitely nothing less.