Doug Martsch has a nasally voice. He sounds a lot like Neil Young.

Neil Young is cool, but I’m only 24 — I wasn’t even alive during Vietnam. And the 60s were awhile ago. Don’t get me wrong — I love old music, but usually only when the dude (or dudette) is dead. That’s how I can love The Velvet Underground & Nico but wish for death before seeing a Rolling Stones show. It’s why I cherish my Pixies records and it’s the same reason I would kill my own family before seeing them live after their reunion.

In a perfect world, all great musicians would die from a drug overdose or suicide during the crescendo of their musical careers. But that won’t happen. And that’s why I continue to dream.

I’m getting off track here though. Built To Spill is a version of Neil Young for the MTV generation. For those of us who didn’t grow up in the 60s and 70s swallowing acid with our morning cheerios and smoking doobies while protesting the war. These days — the days of blogging our Dubya hatred inbetween page refreshes of Digg and Myspace — we need a new, less political Neil Young. A Neil Young who’s more sad and depressing. A Neil Young who was barely even alive during ‘Nam. A Neil Young who makes feeling sad okay despite living in an upper middleclass suburban oasis of trustfund hippies. Give us a Neil Young who understands that we wear flip-flops to work and our parents give us our money. Well, that Neil Young is Doug Martsch, and he has written his most culminating record yet — an unparalleled opus brimming with beauty and sadness.

In fact, I kind of hope Doug Martsch dies now because he’s not going to top this.

As is the case with most of Martsch’s work, it took me damn near two months to fall in love with this record. It’s the kind of album you put in, knowing you’re supposed to love, only to find yourself switching to the latest indie band with ‘wolf’ in its name, forgetting about it in a few days and eventually posting on your blog that it’s underwhelming — giving it a nod in your top 25 at the end of the year in name only.

(Hint: that was me)

Then I kept accidentally listening to it. Not even realizing that the sheer beauty of this record was hammering itself into my brain. One day the guitar solo from “Mess With Time” came on. Then I played it again. And again. And again.

That’s more or less what happens with every Built To Spill record, but You In Reverse is just so fulfilling, so inspiring. It’s enchanting even. And also sad. And, Lord knows I love sad music. Martsch’s aforementioned Neil Young-esque nasal whine allows him to sing damn near anything (I’m pretty sure he could sing happy birthday and I’d be in tears) and make me glad to be crying.