Pop punk, of course, is everywhere these days. Every crayon-eating shmub who grew up listening to Green Day and the Offspring on MTV figures “pop punk” is the perfect bridge between street cred and Life Styles of the Rich and Famous. This might be one such band. But I hope 5¢ Deposit doesn’t wind up on MTV Cribs anytime soon, cuz then I’ll have to eat several crows for admitting that I don’t hate this disc....but I can definitely see it happening. This is fairly generic stuff, but it’s energetic with just a bit of snarl and could reasonably be compared to something like the Descendents on a bad day. And while I don’t heap that kind of feint praise on just anyone, I still can’t shake the image of Carson Daly interviewing these guys with a throng of pubescent girls squealing in the background. I didn’t get any photos with this CD, but I hope for the band’s sake that these guys are ugly and fat and have body odor problems. But I doubt it. TRL here they come.
–aphid (Radical)