Morning View

As soon as California polyglots Incubus achieved mainstream success in the late '90s, frontman Brandon Boyd and guitarist Mike Einziger set out to differentiate the band. For 2001’s <i>Morning View</i>, Einziger wrote riff-packed songs ("Have You Ever," "Circles") that are familiarly heavy and cathartic, yet surprisingly melodically nimble, while Boyd's introspective lyrics and pensive crooning provide a template for empathic headbanging. Moving beyond an all-metal all-the-time template, Incubus also craft funk-soul ("Are You In?"), cinematic ballads ("Mexico") and expansive art-rock ("Aqueous Transmission").