After a series of albums, Axxess and Ace, Ghost Tropic and Didn’t It Rain, that took his music to the bleakest ends of a hypnotized earth, Songs: Ohia’s Jason’s Molina began making different plans. He named his last Songs: Ohia album The Magnolia Electric Co. and then named a band from there. The expanded sound and more consistent line-up creates the expected band vibe, a communal feeling deliberately absent from Molina’s previously isolated recordings. From the first notes of “Farewell Transmission,” the sound is notably amped up and more conventional. The country pickings opening up “Just Be Simple” recast Molina as an alt-country rocker surveying a Midwest that’s played home to everyone from Son Volt to Bonnie “Prince” Billy. Even vocal duties are distributed, as Lawrence Peters guests on “The Old Black Hen” and Scout Niblett adds her touch to “Peoria Lunch Box Blues.” Molina drops much of the ominous tone, but his heart-wrenching loneliness still surfaces magnificently on the album’s closer, “Hold On Magnolia,” one of the finest songs Molina’s ever written.