Say Anything Album: “In Defense of the Genre [Clean]”

Allright, after having ...was a realy boy in heavy rotation shortly before this came out, it was a no brainer. I had it for a couple of months before I gave it all that much attention. I have listened to this album A LOT. To be honest, I don't see what all the bitchin is about. It seems to be a lot like the last album which is fine with me, I love them both. At a glance, it seems to be different, more electronic sounding, but when you get down to it, it's fantastic and really pretty similar to the last. So, if you loved Was/is a real boy, i think you'll probably love this too.

I can't speak for the previous review, but I bought this album from Target (of all places) for $7.98, and it is one of the best albums of the year. I was wary of the hype, to be honest, after it was selected as one of the Best Albums of the Year by both Alternative Press and Spin, but I was curious and it was cheap. Needless to say, I was amazed! It is a double album full of bitchin' (yeah, I'm bringing it back) songs and I doubt you can get more bang for your buck than this album even at full price. I've been hearing that their first single is tanking on radio (in Denver at least), but they aren't a very radio-friendly band. They have at least 10 songs on the album that are better than their current single. Give them a chance and I promise that you won't be disappointed. The album is worth it for the song "About Falling" alone.

Whoa......this CD is completely amazing. It totally surprised me, completely surpassing anything on Is A Real Boy and has shown that this band is probably one of the best punk rock bands around, and they really have a bright future ahead of them if they continue like this. This 27-song CD IS unfortunately too long (and about 10 of those songs I didn't like,) but 17 songs on here are absolutely amazing and so interesting and so powerful. It's truly great stuff. Listening to this entire CD may prove disjointed but once you find out which songs to skip (or better yet, upload the CD onto your computer and only pick the songs you like,) continuously listening to this CD provides an epic experience unlike anything I've ever felt with a rock CD before. Max Bemis is probably the best lyricist currently in rock music and his dark sense of humor as well as the autobiographical nature of many of these songs provide some very deep lyrics that are always interesting and sometimes very true-to-life. This guy tells it like it is. Musically this band's also come a very long way since their debut CD, and the variety is never ending here; slow songs, fast-paced screaming songs, punk rock songs, sincere love songs....it's all done so well on here. Had it not been for those extra 10 tracks this would have been a PERFECT CD but if you skip through those you've still got 17 great songs on here, and that's more than most CD's provide. This is an amazing CD and Say Anything fans and rock fans should definitely check it out, there are so many layers here and there's so much to these songs and hidden melodies and the band's traditional "mid-song tone changes" keep these songs all very fresh. "Plea" ends this CD with a very epic sound and it's a really heartfelt song and it reminds us of how far this band's come from their first CD. Great job, guys. Hopefully you get even more recognition.

The songs I liked;

Disc 1;

Skinny Mean Man (Excellent song)

No Soul (Excellent song)

Surgically Removing the Tracking Device (good song)

This is ******* Ecstacy (Excellent song)

Shiksa (good song, would have been excellent without the annoying refrain, though)

Baby Girl, I'm a Blur (good song)

An Insult to the Dead (great song)

Sorry Dudes, My Bad (great song)

Disc 2;

Spay Me (good song that gets better and better as it goes)

In Defense of the Genre (good song)

The Word You Wield (Excellent song)

Vexed (great song)

About Falling (good song)

Spores (Excellent Song)

We Killed it (great song)

Have At Thee (great song)

Plea (Excellent song)

I love this band and all their albums there isn't a song you wont enjoy! Love them all..seeing them and Motioncity Soundtrack in November~cant wait!

this should have been trimmed to one CD with 14 tracks and released a b-side cd with the rest. but, overall it's lived up to the impossible hype it was given.