Is there a double-edged sword that cuts as incisively both ways for a rock band as the acclaimed debut album? Slender Means might be at a loss to say what it is. The Seattle’s band’s razor-sharp Neon & Ruin (Mt Fuji Records) was hailed as “an amazingly accomplished album of indie-pop perfection” (KEXP.org), “an indie-pop grand slam” (The Stranger), and “a powerful and masterful debut, as passionate as it is rocking” (MSN). Packing eleven songs and innumerable hooks into less than forty minutes...