emo lane: summer goes on.

THE ANNIVERSARY broke up in 2004 but continue to gain a following as their albums Designing For A Nervous Breakdown and Your Majesty are passed down from emo kid to emo kid...or more accurately, file sharing system to emo kid. In my "emo" phase, I scrounged through servers to find new tunes. I would download album after album of artists listed as "emo", only hanging on to the few that satisfied my ears immediately. Eventually my obsession ended, and I deleted most of the albums. Designing A Nervous Breakdown is one of few full albums still kicking after the great deletion of 2004. Why? Despite several songs being remarkably similar, I can still listen to the album to this day. Sure...it's whiney, melodramatic, and everything you expect from emo, but something about the instrumentation and male/female duel vocals made The Anniversary stand out among other emo acts.

In fact, the simple inclusion of female vocals makes them stand out. Emo is a heavily male-dominated genre for several reasons. The ladies are left voiceless. Even if a girl wanted to sing emo, she'd have to declare that she's "emo" and therefore look like a total poser who's trying too hard. Otherwise, her "emo" music would be labeled as chick rock or lesbian music. The reason males dominate the genre is because of the limitations of the word and gender norms. Men are expected to bottle up their emotions and suck it up, but when they let 'em out...whether they like it or not, a scarlet E is slapped onto their breasts. When women express their emotions musically, society says they're just being women. Am I wrong to say that? Because I said it.

In any case, it's awfully refreshing to hear Adrianne Verhoeven's smooth vocals flawlessly blending with the male vocals of the album. Her work on the keyboard is what makes the sound of The Anniversary so unique. Without her, there would be no band. In this sense, she's one of the first ladies of emo. None have come close to taking her thrown, other than Michelle Nolan of Straylight Run...but we'll talk about her later.

DOWNLOAD: THE ANNIVERSARY- All Things Ordinary
DOWNLOAD: THE ANNIVERSARY- Emma Discovery

BUY Designing A Nervous Breakdown

CORRECTION: My emo expert friend has corrected me that there is a popular emo band with a female lead singer, Paramore. Perhaps I shall look into them.

BLOGWATCH: Later, I'm sleepy!

emo lane: heaven is not here for me anymore.

Dashboard Confessional's new album? I will admit that I didn't have high hopes for it. I didn't expect it to change my life. I didn't expect it to be the Mona Lisa of rock music...

Before I go on, I will also admit that I used to be a huge fan back in my high school years. "So long, so long" ago, Dashboard Confessional was the soundtrack to my life-- detailing my fears, desires, and insecurities. I was obsessive, snatching up every unreleased song I could find online. At a concert, Chris Carrabba (see left) brushed past me and I didn't notice immediately . When my friends told me, I then proceeded to chase after him with a sharpie and the liner notes for The Places You Have Come to Fear the Most. I had carefully placed them in my pocket for an emergency situation such as this. Alas, I was unable to catch up to him...letting him slip away.

I approached this review with hesitation, simply because I was a fan. This led me to ask, "Did something change in me or did something change in the music?"

The answer: a little bit of both. The NY Times recently wrote an article about how young country singers are hurrying to grow old, singing songs worthy of people twice their age. On the opposite side of the ring, "Emo" frontmen sing songs made for people half their age. The whole sub-genre fosters a hesitance to grow up and confront problems, hence it's appeal to tweens and adolescents.

With that said, dear ol' Mr. Carabba hasn't grown up with his fans on Dusk and Summer. But does it even matter? As his old fans grow, a new generation of fans enter. On top of that, some old fans refuse to let go of the voice that helped them survive their first real break-up, unrequited crush, etc.

Even I hesitated to let go. After listening several times to the last album A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar, I felt absolutely nothing. I questioned whether I was becoming some sort of musical elitist...I questioned whether I had become emotionless. I pretended to like it for awhile. I tried to find it's strengths. And in the end of this struggle, the music was the loser. I went back to listen to older recordings and felt nothing aside from a soft touch of nostalgia.

Of course, it's not just me...it's him. He's changed. The obvious change is the move from acoustic guitar to full band. Some would call that selling out, but I think it's the general trend with solo acts. They get big enough...and then they get bands. Unfortunately for Chris, it seems all the sincerity went out the window as the drummer and bass player climbed in.

Lyrically, Carrabba has become less blunt, requiring listeners to dissect the lyrics to find a surprisingly unprofound message. Gone are the days of "I tried on my blue shirt, she told me she liked it, once" and in comes "And I will leave under the cover of summer's kiss upon the sky like the stone face of your lover just before she says goodbye". This is a shame, as the mindlessness of his earlier songs is what gave him the charm to stand out among other emo acts. Now all he has is his signature wail, a wail becoming less original as others try to imitate it.

I suppose this is a review though. And now that it's taken me as long as one of those signature wails to create a dialogue about Mr. Carrabba and his musical integrity, I don't know if I can give you that. It will just be very negative and tainted with the jaded opinions of a former fan. This is no longer my music. So long, so long.

DOWNLOAD: DASHBOARD CONFESSIONAL- So Long, So Long
DOWNLOAD: DASHBOARD CONFESSIONAL- The Secret's In The Telling

PRE-ORDER Dusk and Summer, to be released June 27th

BLOGWATCH: As promised, Stars are Blind delivered the new Janet Jackson single. Check out a show by The Decemberists over at B(oot)log or catch a stunning set by Jose Gonzalez on KCRW over at rbally.

...And don't forget to sign the petition to save network neutrality, blogging, and the internet.

emo lane: aspirins and alcohol.

Inspired by my trip down memory lane caused by Andy Greenwald's book Nothing Feels Good: Punk Rock, Teenagers, and Emo, this begins a new series of posts embracing the days when I would wear a Taking Back Sunday t-shirt without embarassment or shame. The days when I would blast songs that included repeated choruses of "Spoon Out My Heart". The days when I was "emo".

These are the songs that I hate to still love...which I suppose is sort of emo for me to say.

My first post of this series starts off with "Aspirins and Alcohol" by Stockholm rockers Last Days of April. After discovering this song on the Emo is Awesome, Emo is Evil compilation that I shamelessly bought from Hot Topic (tell no one) in 2003, it became an anthem of mine for whenever I felt moody. This was awfully strange because I was much too smart to involve myself in such self-destructive behaviors as downing aspirins and alcohol to deal with my problems. I suppose what made the song so appealing was the sense of longing as frontman Karl Larsson utters "What I'd give to...be the one. Have my name linger...on your tongue". This is paired with apathy as he repeatedly states, "That's nice" as if he doesn't actually care that the antagonist is going to break another man's heart. Add a few violins to that, and I'm sold.

Emo Qualifications: Touring with The Promise Ring, being on a compilation with the word "emo" in the title, self-deprecation, and other factors

DOWNLOAD: LAST DAYS OF APRIL- Aspirins and Alcohol

Check out more songs at their website, or BUY Angel Youth

BLOGWATCH: Download an entire live show by Fiona Apple over at Looking At Them. Catch The Boy Least Likely To's doing George Michael (his music, not HIM) over at I Guess I'm Floating or You Ain't No Picasso.