Shelving 2005: The College Bookshelf

Theme songs or songs about your own band name always come dangerously close to sounding like novelty act, campy, or embarrassingly silly. Awesome Car Funmaker screams their own band name over their self-named song in two parts. “Part 1” swaggers with a bluesy rock that champions all of the kinds of people that may come to hear the music raised up to raise their spirits. While they namecheck themselves obliquely, the song does make you want to be part of the crowd at an Awesome Car Funmaker show. It’s on “Part 2” that they scream “Awesome Car, Awesome Car, Awesome Car Funmaker,” over speed metal, and here’s the novelty silliness that is only overcome by the fact that the speed metal gives away to a Queen-inspired, Rodney King chorus, “Why can’t there be just a little more love, why can’t there be just a little more peace?” There’s tongue-in-cheek here combined with tremendous rocking skills that can only lead you to take them seriously. That’s the strength of Green Means Go: ACF’s ability to raise up tight, hard rock, smashing down on those rhythms, and doing it all with a wink and a raised fist and a hand-over-heart.

There’s a potential Gospel message in the first track on the Juliana Theory’s Deadbeat Sweetheartbeat (Abacus Recordings). Through their hard-edged Emo, the Juliana Theory sing “This is a Lovesong…For the Loveless,” a phrase which matches what God has done for us in Christ—loving us despite our unloveable, sinful natures. The hard-edged Emo comes through on songs like “We Make the Road By Walking” with an even more full-on sound for “Shotgun Serenade.” “Leave Like a Ghost (Drive Away)” is like Matchbox 20 made more interesting combined with dance hook drums. With “This Valentine Ain’t No Saint,” you’ve got 90’s grunge elements like something off the Singles soundtrack, but you can almost hear Motley Crue or something there, too.

“Hand Stamp” is this funky, playful party song about meeting the bouncer at the door of a private club. It’s that playful way with rock and words that Shamra on the College bookshelf. Frieze (Fum Records) begs comparison’s to the acoustic rock overlay of the Sundays, especially due to the breathy vocals of Shamra’s Carrie Bolger. Elsewhere, though, its got breezy pop beats (“State of the Nation”), while still letting Bolger’s voice prowl. “Limelight,” with its blues-picked guitar and jamming beat, comes right out of the indie sound, and tremendous song exploring how beautiful girls who get all of the attention “feel far from sexy.” Acoustic grooves with odd angles like “Priorities” also bring the Primitives to mind.

Following in the same vein of acoustic overlays on party rock, the Eames Era evoke handclaps and swaying hips, while inviting a little thought, emotion, and heart to those party beats. A comparison with Shamra comes partly because of lead vocalist Ashlin Phillips’ who can sing up to the airy clouds while also giving a little sarcastic snarl to her pop charm, such as on “All of Seventeen.” Their 4-song The Second EP (C-Student Records) will make you feel like going back to high school—while realizing that you can’t go back, you know too much. It’s nostalgic for fun’s sake, but it’s a mature voice that’s retelling all of those stories about how “we did a lot of drugs, or so we said.” The mask is pulled off of the past in such a playful song. A full length album, Double Dutch, is now available.

Besides all of the rockabilly punk charm on the German Art Students’ Name-Droppers (Autobahn Music), this album deserves all attention, all credit, all accolades, because they make modesty into something that’s completely rocking and cool. “No Peekee” jumps in on a pounding bassline with its pop punk vocal callouts. “You wear it where, where, under/It should be where, where, under/Don’t want to know I’d rather wonder,” doesn’t lead to rock ‘n’ roll excess. Instead, it’s calling on people to get modest, get covered up, which is actually more intriguing anyway. Invite the German Art Students to the next Abstinence Club meeting at your high school. Overall, the German Art Students bring out some intelligent, pop punk that goes back to the rockabilly that inspired early punk’s like Joe Strummer, while the instrumental “Horses, Hedgerows, and Helmets,” sounds like Camper Van Beethoven.