Abandoned Pools
Mercy Kiss

This, my friends, is radio-rock. In its worst form. Can you hear it? It's the damning sound of mediocrity. This is a more blindly optimistic Semisonic. This is Andreas Johnson. At its absolute best point, it's Scarfo without the skills or the skewed, eerie tendencies.

I don't know where they're from. I don't know what they look like. I don't care. Nothing about this record makes me want to know anything about them. Fact: the average listener will listen to this song, nod in mild appreciation and then completely forget it ever existed within three minutes of the song finishing. This is the kind of thing that could fill up Jo Whiley's show with ease. They'd like you to think they're dangerous, fast ROCK, because they have, like, a really big riff, right there. Don't be fooled, comrades. The riffs are restrained in the worst possible way. The quieter bits are devoid of subtlety or beauty. The lyrics are banal. These people are not your friends. Walk away from them.