Album Reviews
On their second album, Philadelphia duo The Obsessives – guitarist/vocalist Nick Bairatchnyi and drummer Jackson Mansfield – dish out fourteen tracks worth of indie meets emo that aspire to be as quirky as The Front Bottoms and Modern Baseball while also paying tribute to Weezer’s talent for writing badass hooks.
They almost pull it off. The deliciously crunchy “Violent” for example is nothing but fun. Just too bad it is immediately followed by the absolutely unnecessary “A Shady Place”. From there on, it keeps on being everyone’s guess whether the next track will be as solid as “If You Really Love Me” or completely skip-worthy like “He Is Wise”. And try as I might, I just couldn’t get into Bairatchnyi’s bored, deadpan delivery which becomes more tedious with ever song that passes.
Track listing:
- Intro
- You're My God
- Surfer Rosa
- Violent
- A Shady Place
- If You Really Love Me
- Now She's Smoking
- It's Not Fair
- In Her Belly
- It's Okay If
- He Is Wise
- Sometimes
- When One Thing Ends
- You're Gonna Be
Lacking the talent to actually play in a band, Tom decided he would write about bands instead. Turns out his writing skills are mediocre at best as well.
