Review: Something Corporate: Leaving Through The Window

by Ice Cream Jonsey

First off, I should state that the lead singer in this band sounds like a complete and total drama queen for just about all the tracks. If you're not into that kind of thing then nothing I can write will convince you to give this disc any kind of shot. Much like how I can hate an entire video game because it won't let me hit the "escape" key and save, I understand that someone could listen to the beginning of "The Astronaut" on this CD and say, "Ah, that's enough for me, thanks much."

However, if you can deal with the stressed-out sound of vocalist (and pianist, here) Andrew McMahon then there is a lot of good stuff on this release. I should say that I can stomach the sound of his voice, but it's real close. With that in mind:

Something Corporate is a band that I found due to their inclusion on a "mix disc" put out by their label, Drive-Thru Records. Though the internet is an evil and hated device that Hillary Rosen would remove off the face of the planet in a moment if given superuser access to the "rm internet.bas" command on the government computer at Colorado Springs that has the ability to in fact delete the net, it did kind of help me discover these guys. So profits for all, then. You have to get by the bad name ("Something Corporate"? I mean, give me a break. You can't just tell someone you're listening to a band with that name. You need to explain it. That's really stupid and it's a really stupid name, but it's par for the course when it comes to the bands on the Drive-Thru label -- you need to do the exact same thing for Home Grown, New Found Glory and FenixTX, don't you?) ... and then the fun starts.

The disc, as a whole, is pretty good, but there are some serious rough spots and spots that I will fast forward through. It starts off well enough with "I Want To Save You" and "Punk Rock Princess." They are by no means the two best songs anyone has ever started an album with, but they kind of go someplace and are indicative of what you're in for with the CD.

I really like the third track ("I Woke Up in a Car"). It's a showcase for the band's potential. The lyrics are solid and can be taken a couple of different ways. (If you go in thinking it's about the 9/11 attacks, which I suspect it is not, you get a wholly different feel for the song than you would otherwise. It's not like trying to discern the meaning of "One of These Days" or anything, but miles beyond the stuff you normally get to ponder on an emo disc.) So there's some momentum here, which unfortunately derails with the next two songs.

"iF U C Jordan"  has got to be one of the dumbest songs ever written. Both from its terribly spelled name ("Oh, "Fuc Jordan," hahaha -- I mean, give me a break, if you're going to attempt to "hide" a message in the title of your song either put the "K" there and capitalize it improperly or just call the fucking thing "If You See Jordan" and let us figure it out ourselves. Bad, bad, bad.) and content, it fires off a 'repulse' vibe like six clerics trying to fight the head Lich in Baldur's Gate II. Things don't get much better with the next song, "The Astronaut." If there is one cliche in music that I abhor, it's someone telling me how great it is to "get high" in a song. Singing, "I need to get hiiiiiiiiiighhhh" over and over again for the chorus is really embarrasing to have to go through. Attempting to make it "subtle" by singing about an astronaut doesn't work either. At least give me "cosmonauts" instead or something, narmean? You really have to wonder if the guys in Something Corporate have any respect whatsoever for the intelligence of their audience for pulling two stunts like this back to back.

"Hurricane" and "Cavanaugh Park" are next up, and both of these songs are best described as "fine." The former is a bit more rage-in-the-cage than the latter, but placing them in this order presents a nice effect.

Where Leaving Through The Window really shines is in the next two bits. "Fall" and "Straw Dog" are two of the best new songs I've heard as of late. "Fall" has a pulsing, almost march-type thing going on that makes you want to sing along. The 22 hours of sunshine and oppressive heat we get out here makes that impossible to do out here if you want to retain any sense of personal dignity while driving on the road, but when night appears for its token bit I'm all over this one, I must confess. Maybe I'm just a sucker, and a sissy-soft sucker at that, but I really dig the line, "How can you ask for me to stay when all you ever do is go" in the context of this song. Alone, sure, just another dollup of angst. But it really comes off well here. You kind of wish that Partington could have come have come up with a lyric that was a bit different than "I just can't handle this, handle this at all," but that's a minor nitpick. "Straw Dog" is great, from beginning to end. Going in I don't know what a straw dog is, or why it would be significant enough to write a song about, but the creativity here gives me a take on it when the song is through. When this band comes up with their follow-up album (something I am guessing that they will definitely get a chance to do, what with "I Woke Up in a Car" getting radio play as of late) I truly hope that we get a lot more stuff like "Fall" and "Straw Dog."

"Good News" is next, but as it's situated between "Straw Dog" and "Drunk Girl" I find myself bypassing it, due to no real fault of its own. "Drunk Girl" is good fun and in fact one of the songs I put into the MP3 directory while playing Grand Theft Auto III. The Queen-inspired guitar voice at the beginning of this one fits in well, too.

"Not What It Seems" seems, er, a bit longer than the 3:18 that it in fact is. Closing out the disc is "You're Gone" and "Globes and Maps," which are both rather introspective and a nice way to unwind after how pumped you get after the beginning of the second half of the disc.

The impression that I get after having the thing in more or less constant rotation for the last couple of months is that there is a tremendous amount of potential for the band -- but I'm not really sure which way they will go. If the juvenile stuff can be cut and just a bit more time given to the lyrics there is a chance to match, if not outright exceed, the really good bits of the various Ben Folds Five albums. If not, if they go for that high school vibe and keep ranting about the various Jordans out there then I think they will be destined to become just another junk band with nothing interesting to say. Regardless, there is a lot of recommendable stuff in Leaving Through The Window and I will be pumped to see what they come up with next.