The Hives – “The Black and White Album”

Rating: 6 / 10

Label: Universal

Background: After three albums of playing fast and loud garage rock, including the hit, “Hate to Say I Told You So,” the Swedish quintet, led by the “Howlin'” Pelle Almqvist, expand their sound with help from producers Dennis Herring (Modest Mouse, Elvis Costello) and Pharrell Williams of the Neptunes.

The Good: Songs like “Hey Little World,” “Bigger Hole to Fill” and “Return the Favor” are catchy, stadium-sized anthems worthy enough to be played by a band as hell-bent on world domination as the Hives.

The Bad: The album has tedious filler tracks. Also, The Hives are best experienced live – and they’re not due back in America until February or March of 2008.

The Lowdown: When the Hives first broke through in 2002 with “Veni Vedi Vicious,” they were lumped together with the Strokes, the White Stripes and the Vines as garage rock revivalists.

But anyone who saw them live knew they had much bigger ambitions. Not since Oasis began telling people they were the best band in the world had a group so unapologetically declared themselves as “Your new favorite band.”

Five years later, the Hives seem to be getting closer to their goal. In support of “The Black and White Album,” their fourth overall, the band has toured with Maroon 5, slightly changed their sound and worked with some big names, like Pharrell Williams. Earlier this year, they even collaborated with Timbaland on his solo album, “Shock Value.”

Because of this, “The Black and White Album” spends much of its time with New Wave-style dance songs. One of the Pharrell-produced tracks, called “T.H.E.H.I.V.E.S.,” is the most straight-up disco song they’ve put out so far.

“The Black and White Album,” clocks in at 45 minutes, which isn’t long by any means, but still sounds stretched in Hives terms. It causes the band to succumb to the sad cliché of a slow, middle-of-the-album-instrumental song called, “A Stroll Through Hive Manor Corridors.”

While their experiments cause the album to lose focus and momentum, it doesn’t completely ruin it. With their matching black and white suits, The Hives are out to get as many people dancing as possible.

All the added production can’t hide the fact that it’s only rock and roll, and pretty good rock and roll at that.