It’s obvious by the number of hatchet jobs handed to The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn: CocoRosie remain on the receiving end of a perpetual backlash. Bands are dissed daily, but the energy focused on the sisters Casady borders on violence—they come complete with layers of sparkled eccentricity, yeah, but to my mind that eccentricity seems natural and, well, honest rather than an affectation.

Jabs started early with their 2004 debut. The list of complaints (in part): Bianca and Sierra camped out in Paris when recording La Maison de Mon Rêve, connoting to some, I guess, ex-pat bohemian wealth (forget the fact that the record was born from the joy of familial reunion... Bianca traveled overseas, relocated). They dress intricately, eclectically, and partake in fashion spreads (when I saw them open for Antony at the Bowery Ballroom, the drab, pasty GAP dude in front of me was fuming at their tracksuits and Sierra's pillbox hat). Or, the music's seen as precious, self-consciously quirky, and pretentious—how is it that people trashing CocoRosie deify Joanna Newsom?

Detractors haven't been appeased, but The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn is the duo's strongest work to date: The writing's silly, witty, cornball, smart, beautiful. The best songs ("Promise," "Animals," "Werewolf," "Miracle") are jammed with the most beats and syllables. Certain images repeat: baptism, water, and tears mix with dishwater, swimming pools, telepathy, sound effects. Parents are schizophrenic and there's a recurrent notion of spreading childlike innocence or a non-innocent childlike joy. "Sunshine" follows a bike ride around the block; elsewhere we're told everyone has a "rainbow trail" inside their body/soul, a "mystical beauty." What folks tend to miss is that it isn't so cutesy; instead, the duo work like Beat Happening used to do, creating a place where both souls and sheets are stained and magical realism abounds. Once you start analyzing, it scans like birth to present autobiography, cuts and bruises intact.