I got home late from work this evening to find a slim, unexpected package with overseas looking postage and customs forms tacked on it. After quickly sniffing it to make sure it didn’t contain blasting caps or kerosene or Ebola virus, I sliced it open to discover the long-awaited third disc from brilliant singer-songwriter-guitarist Max Eider laying within. He doesn’t put such things out very often, so when one arrives, it’s generally cause in the Smith household for huzzahs and lawks. So . . . Huzzahs! And Lawks! (See my Metroland review of his last album, Hotel Figueroa, here, for some perspective on his ouvre). The new record is called Max Eider III: Back in the Bedroom. I’m three songs into it as I type this post, and it’s thus far as delicious and lovely and bittersweet and wistful as all the best bits of my well worn copies of his earlier solo discs and his works with The Jazz Butcher and David J. I can’t recommend strongly enough that you seek out and acquire this disc and its predecessors. Friends, associates and party-crashers of all ages, shapes, sizes, tattoo levels and tastes have paused when Max pops up on the mix tape or iPod over dinner or drinks at our house and said “Wow! This is great! Who ’tis?” And any artist who’ll make casual first-time listeners pause, take notice, and inquire about their dinner music has got something working the way its supposed to work. You too will be happy happy when your own slim package arrives from Tundraducks Records. I promise.