:: Record Review

+/- (Plus Minus)

You Are Here
(Teenbeat; 2003)

Rating: 30%

I’m certainly not going to say that I had great, great hopes for +/-, nor will I say I thought this band would take the kind of low road that have led them to You Are Here. Their debut (_Self-Titled Long Playing Debut_) made up its missteps with clever production and James Baluyut’s vocals. Unfortunately, their new album removes just about all of these aspects from their sound, leaving only stale and predictable “pop” in its place.

Clearly realizing what unremarkable trash will follow it, Baluyut wisely chooses to place the album’s best song, “Ventriloquist,” up front. The beat programming is lazy, but, unlike the majority of You Are Here, it works because of the memorable melody repeated throughout. And, uh, thus exhausts the great aspects of the album, leaving the next ten tracks to gradually transform the band into a glorified high school act with a terribly unambitious producer.

Forget trying to put this into paragraph form, this would be much easier in short point form:

“Surprise”: Sounds absolutely foolish following “Ventriloquist.” Instantly forgettable.

“Trapped Under Ice Floes (Redux)”: Even worse. The band attempts being a MOR alt-rock band—but at least in this they succeed.

“She’s Got Your Eyes”: Extrapolates one of the most banal melodies I’ve heard all year over four minutes. Terrible lyrics. There is really no need for this song to exist.

“Summer Dress 1 (All Her Winter Clothes)”: What happened to his voice? Out of tune, cold and lifeless.

“Cutting Out”: One of the album’s better tracks by far and should’ve been at least put closer to the beginning. Far too little too late after those last four tracks.

“Megalomaniac”: This picture expresses this song much better than my words ever could:

“Scarecrow”: Completely without focus. His vocals finally resemble parts of their debut (“All I Do,” for instance), but this comes off like Muse.

“No One Sees You Like I Do”: The only other good song on the record. Finally the production gets some attention, but again, far too little far too late. Unfortunately, about half way through they take time to splice distorted guitar in and out of the mix and it sounds terrible. Things get better for a very short time.

“Here We Are (Again)”: An encore:

“Everything I See Makes It Feel Wrong”: And I quote, “the only thing I see is that you’re gone / everything I see makes it feel wrong / and I think I’m sinking fast / to the bottom of the glass / and I know I’ll lose my mind / it’s the only thing that lets me forget that you’re gone.” Queue some elevator-style musak backgrounds. Repeat. Unlike the proverbial girl he’s crooning over, however, this song—and the album, for that matter—will be extremely easy to forget once it’s gone. No need for elevator-style music or bad poetry.

Really, I don’t know what happened to this band. After the possibilities opened by their debut (which was really all over the place with enough skill to pull most of it off, “Yo Yo Yo” being the obviously exception), why they/he would choose to release something as tepid and forgettable as this just a year later is absolutely dumbfounding. This isn’t the first time this has happened and sadly won’t be the last. Sometimes a band will release a promising debut and follow it up with complete garbage that does nothing except take the worst parts of their debut and focus on them for a torturous hour. This is one of those records.