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North Elementary are a pop band from Chapel Hill, NC, and i owe them an apology. I have had this promo sitting in my "to review" stack for almost a full year now, and i have just had trouble writing this review. Chalk it up to writer's block, or laziness, whatever. The fact is, i slacked off, and i'm sorry for that. The thing is: this is a pretty cool CD. It's not the most groundbreaking album i have heard in the past year, but there is a lot of fun stuff going on here.
In particular, Into You is an exquisite pop song, with crunchy guitar chording and "la-la-la" backing vocals making it catchy and fun. The melody here is hummable, and this song deserves to be a hit on some radio station, somewhere. Excellent work. It is also the real high point of the album, even though there are a few other worthwhile songs here.
Lazy Daisy almost hints back to the heyday of grunge, with loud drumming and some fuzzed out guitars. And yet, the vocals here almost have a J Mascis whine to them. It all combines to make a fun song.
Chemicals has a happy little toe-tapping rhythm, and a female voice accompanies the usual male singer to great effect. This is a nice pop tune.
Finally, Supergirl descends into a level of trippy stoner folk music that recalls the pleasanter work of Robyn Hitchcock. This is a fun, if silly, tune.
The rest of the songs on this album are okay, but they are pretty generic for pop/rock bands in the South. That is, i can hear that type of music played by a dozen bands in this town, and probably about 50 in Athens. That said, people who are into that type of music (think: The
Possibilities, Elf Power, etc.) will probably really enjoy this album. Personally, i want North Elementary to keep writing songs like Into You. Careers have been constructed out of trying to replicate worse songs...
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