The All-American Rejects - Kids in the Street





For me, the All-American Rejects are walking around the beach listening to 'The Last Song' and 'Swing Swing' on my first iPod. Their whole teenage powerpop thing never wholly translated this side of the Atlantic in the same way that, say, Fall Out Boy, 30 Seconds to Mars or My Chemical Romance did. Stateside, though, they've only grown and grown in pop success - culminating in the #4 Billboard position for Gives You Hell from their 2009 album, When the World Comes Down. Working this time around with Greg Wells - the man who produced Katy Perry's career-high Waking Up in Vegas, OneRepublic's Apologize and Mika's 2007 debut album Life in Cartoon Motion, it'll be interesting to see how their forray into the popworld goes (at least musically, since statistically they've charted quite disappointingly - singles-wise at least).

Let's face it, with a face (and body... *contains myself*) like Tyson Ritter's, the band are going to continue to pluck at teenage heartstrings for some time to come.




With a distorted roar, 'Someday's Gone' opens the album and sees Ritter pondering "what makes you so damn sure you're worth it?" The song plods along pretty nicely and safely, with the solos at the ends of each chorus redeeming it. Single 'Beekeeper's Daughter' failed to impress initially but given about 5 or more listens it's rewarding. Trumpets and "ahh"s in the build-up to an understated chorus give it a Panic! at the Disco feel, but otherwise the whole thing smacks of bar-room singalong and it's quite infectious. Much more urgent is 'Fast & Slow', which falls a little too clumsily into the Neon Trees bracket with lazy rhymes and a relatively bland tune. The angst is turned up a notch though on 'Heartbeat Slowing Down' (I mean, it opens with "I still remember that empty look on your face"), with a nice synth-laden chorus and rasped vocals.

The opening to 'Walk Over Me' with a psychiatrist is a little bit kitsch but is quickly forgotten in a bit of a Status Quo revivalism. The riffs are short and fast, the rhythm bouncy, but once you draw the Status Quo comparison you can't take it seriously. Sure is catchy, though. They remove the daftness then for 'Out the Door', a slow paced builder that eventually turns into their blusteriest moment of the album. It's fine but a little conventional. There are shades of U2 (at least in the guitar effects) about the title track that give it some distinctiveness but again the track's largely undermined by the most generic lyrics imaginable ("We were dreamers, we were American graffiti scenes/ No war, no peace, no hopes, no dreams - just us").

Equally turgid ("I need you one last time") and bereft of any musical interest whatsoever is 'Bleed Into Your Mind', a leading candidate for 'Filler of the Year', surely. It's a bit of a shame that we come to expect those tracks of bands like AAR, because they are capable of some really endearing and promising moments. 'Gonzo', a track that might owe a little of its rhythm to U2's Where the Streets Have No Name, but is otherwise a strong synth-rock track that delivers their niche power-pop with aplomb. They do their best for a little strings-led ballad in 'Affection' that's again slightly let down by the lyrics, but the musical side of it is rather lovely. Closing track 'I For You' is similarly cute and twee and all things "omg luv u tyler!!! xD".

The record's not going to last long in the consciousness of most people, but if you fancy a little bit of angsty teen-rock (even despite the fact the band are increasingly near their 30s) the album definitely delivers.

Rating: 6/10
Highlights: Gonzo, Heartbeat Slowing Down, Beekeeper's Daughter
Avoid: Bleed Into Your Mind, Fast & Slow, Walk Over Me

Artwork Watch: I have no smart-arse comments for this. I quite like it.
Up next: Marilyn Manson

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues, a review

Image
In 2008 the Fleet Foxes launched onto the music scene with their eponymous debut, landing themselves #1 positions in end-of-year reviews from the likes of Pitchfork, The Times and Mojo. Their unique brand of baroque-fused folk struck a chord with many, and the time has now come for them to follow that success up. In May they will release 'Helplessness Blues', the title track for which they recently released as a free download. The opening track 'Montezuma' is a slow repeat of their signature sound - the version I have unfortunately riddled with a few technical glitches - a minimalist and pensive reflection on life and impending death. In dirth or in excess /Both the slave and the empress/ Will return to the dirt I guess/ Naked as when they came. There's a slight rockabilly tune to 'Bedouin Dress', a slight threat to Robin's claim that the record will be "less poppy, less upbeat and more groove-based". The groove is certainly here, a Garfunkelia
Read more

Lady GaGa - ARTPOP

Image
Ah, the Lady GaGa album cycle. It's rivalled only by the surfacing of a celebrity's nudes in the "what gets the gays riled up" stakes, and is subject to a hideous level of hyperbole, high expectations and Germanotta's own unmistakeable hubris. This time around she's stretched as far as vowing to be the actual first popstar to perform in space (many have claimed they will, but apparently she actually will), has made a typically overstated cameo in Robert Rodriguez's Machete Kills , and gone down the gimmicky app route that Bjork and Jay Z did to varying results (Bjork's was innovative and interesting, Jay's was done for a deal with Samsung, go figure). GaGa herself has clumsily tread between the two: her own app appeared to be free, as she probably intended, but now something's popped up, most likely thanks to the label, with O2 that charges consumers £1 a week to listen to it a week earlier than its release date. This careless slipping be
Read more

Icona Pop - Icona Pop

Image
Although usually condusive of a bemused shrug (honestly, I swear some of their featured musicians are made up), the 'Best New Track' feature of Pitchfork occasionally throws up something surprising and instantly loveable: I Don't Care by Icona Pop was just one of them. So when this was also recommended by Popjustice, and given my desperate attempts to immerse myself in pop music and simultaneously be cool, I hopped aboard the bandwagon with gusto. And you know what? I love it. That phenomenal single aside, Sweden's newest pop sensations have, off the back of their international (modest) success, find themselves yet to take over the UK or States. Let's hope, then, that they're not doomed to an embarrassing record label drop and future solo efforts on the X Factor (in the same vein as Mini Viva , who had equally brilliant but tragically-ignored singles) or a series of delayed release dates of album #2 ( VV Brown ). The album, however, seeks to buck the
Read more