!! a spare 15 minutes!!

I'll get straight to the point. Say Anything - not impressed.Some here may have flicked over my bubbling anticipation of Say Anything's 2nd [still available] album. True, due to technical difficulties (as in it takes the freaking record shop 2 months and counting to get the order from the US) I have not heard the full first album, '...Is A Real Boy' yet, but for me the spark has died. I couldn't make it through both discs of the latest record, 'In Defense of the Genre' (but not because it was unlistenable, House was about to start), but from the generous amount I did experience, nothing jumped out. Some of the lyrics had a few good points, raised interesting issues, but they weren't written as lyrics so much as a monologue. That loses a point in itself. Music needs lyrics, except if it's deliberate spoken word. It's all about how it sounds altogether. But the music didn't make up for it either. There were some fantastic beat changes, showing Max Bemis' musical *capability*, but that was it. None of the fantastic melodic (ah my favourite word) riffery or loverly harmonies of the first album. I put this down to a statement of Max's that Say Anything is a pop band. Back when he was writing for ...Is a Real Boy, pop music wasn't emo music. Nowadays there is a much darker side to pop music, and this is what he's used for influence. Nothing wrong with that, just not my cup of tea. [PS this is just a theory! I'd have to do more research to back it up, but heh, EXAMS ARE KILLING ME]But I find it funny that Say Anything's heroes Saves The Day went all emo-y and are now returning to the more melodic stuff. With much more emo lyrics. My thoughts anyway.For ye entertainment, I shall play the partner in crime of the infamous 'Plug-In Baby', 'Hyper Music'.