Music Notes: The All-American Rejects, Move Along

July 9th, 2006

Tanja received a box of promo CDs from a record label, so I think it will be fun for me to post my aging, Gen X thoughts about this “new music.”

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Music Pop music revolves through cycles of regeneration. Something original comes along, wakes everyone up, and its influence is progressively watered down through various artists until it reaches a commercial zenith, bearing slight resemblance to the original spark, but intentionally defanged in order to sell records to the masses and provide background music for TV commercials. You can draw a pretty straight line from Elvis to the Beatles, Stones, Byrds, and eventually you get Herman’s Hermits. Today we have Radiohead confusing people, but making it possible for suburban houswives to wave lighters at Coldplay concerts. The ensuing boredom makes it possible for the next big thing.

The grunge trend started by Nirvana has led to The All-American Rejects, who sound like Green Day, Matchbox Twenty, Gin Blossoms set to a click track and run through Antares Auto-Tune. The latter two aspects are a bit of a wake-up call to me, as to my uncompressed thirty-something ears, it’s really distastefully noticeable when vocals are so perfectly in tune and the timing so exact that it sounds like a karaoke drum machine downloading code into your eardrums. I guess this aural assault helps sell cars and in turn enables this music to be heard on that car’s radio over the freeway noise.

I’ll admit the crush of guitars and relentless pace results in some hooky songs, such as Dirty Little Secret. There’s some melodic inventiveness and musical competence here. However, there’s an overall feeling of limited range as the slower paced songs with piano and strings are truly terrible. Yet another stereotypical album with only one or two decent tunes. I’ll wager this band will be delegated to a future of WB-teentainment shows and Hillary Duff romantic comedies: not a bad life but certainly nothing Nirvana would have hoped for.