There are those times when you become a bit more aware of life. Whether it’s during that long drive or a walk through a park alone on a winter day, everyone has one of those moments when they think about things a little more. And if you somehow have escaped having such a day, then you’ve definitely seen these moments in a movie, maybe accompanied by a song from Elliott Smith. Well, Mr. Smith, it is time to move over because The Race have provided an excellent soundtrack for those grey contemplative days.

From the first moment of the The Perfect Gift’s opening track, "The Switch Switched," the listener is dropped abruptly into the world of Chicago-based trio and submerged completely into layers of guitar, drums, samples, piano, and guitarist/singer Craig Klein’s long slightly wavering/haunting vocal lines. Even when presented with the minimal guitar and drum instrumentation on tracks such as "The Cat Is Back in the Bag," there is still that feeling of being immersed in a world clouded over by thought.

Klein and drummer Kevin Duneman know the exact borders of the dream world that they create and while often moving breathtakingly close to bursting forth into reality with moments of mounting tension as they do in "It Looks Like a Circle but It’s Really a Spiral." Despite these explorations into the extreme, the decision to remain in territory conducive to contemplation triumphs in the form of rigid distorted guitar lines fading into brief piano interludes followed by Klein’s hypnotic vocals. The same vocals, that on the closing title track, offer the most sobering element on the album closing with "keep it what you see is what you get/it’s the perfect gift."