Stereophonic (4*)

The minute I heard that the guy from Arcade Fire had written the songs for a play about the difficulties and rewards of creative collaboration I bought a ticket.  Poorly titled, Stereophonic is kind of a slow burn but when the band, superbly cast, starts singing behind the glass wall of the incredibly authentic studio that serves as the only set, you know you're in superb hands even if they belong to the younger brother  (oops!) of the frontman in in one of my favorite bands of the new millennium.  The interpersonal dynamics of a band that playwright David Adjimi insists isn't Fleetwood Mac occasionally border on the cliched, but who cares when the music they're making sounds nearly as good as "Rumours"?  Will Brill comically nails the bassist who falls in and out of sobriety as often as love, and Sarah Pidgeon should record the solo album Columbia Records offers her character.  And sure, you want to wring Tom Pecinka's perfectionist neck, but as one terrific goosebump-inducing number demonstrates, nice guys in the studio probably don't make iconic albums no matter how deftly their sound engineers twiddle the mixing knobs.