No Deftones here

From the Attic

Damone

RCA Records

The word Damone first…

From the Attic

Damone

RCA Records

The word Damone first brings to mind the Deftones – “Damone” was the hidden track on Around the Fur, after all.

Since the Deftones are hard-hitting and aggressive, Damone’s release From the Attic might be expected to be similar. But instead, it was extremely upbeat, polished and featured female vocals.

“Frustrated Unnoticed” is the perfect teen-age angst riot grrrl kind of song. It leads off the disc telling you exactly what the band is, because it’s good to make a first impression. The fulcrum of very decent guitar work and lightly accented drums may have saved this album.

Unfortunately, the lyrics are the weak point of the record. Songs such as “Carwash Romance” fall flat when compared with music that’s already out there. What Damone does, they do extremely well: pop-punk with simplistic vocals in an overly polished kind of way. What they don’t do is impress fans with a unique sound. Perhaps it’s just the fact that pop-punk is just so damn marketable nowadays, but it’s getting difficult to find a band that really stands out and does its own thing.

While From the Attic is definitely not going to be as poppy as the next Avril Lavigne cut, its lyrical content would only impress audiences of eighth grade dispositions. How much more can you pulverize the living bejesus out of emo – aren’t the high school romances over now? Musicians attempting to be energetic and overpowering can’t sing about how some boy in their class didn’t notice them, or that they wish they were at the mall (I wish I was kidding, From the Attic includes a song aptly titled “At the Mall”).

The main issue isn’t that people are just more selective during their college days, it’s more or less that once the industry finds something to capitalize on, they refuse to let it go until it crashes and burns to the ground. In the case of pop-punk and emo, it’s withering, dying and wilting. Thankfully, everyone should be over that stage by this point.

This album is good to relive the days of your youth in high school, back when your worst scenario was not having a date to a dance. But let me remind you: You’re in college now.