‘and the land of fake believe’ is a pop-punk CD without the punk. Imagine Busted duetting with Blink 182 and you’d get Son of Dork. Well Eleventyseven are the US equivalent; a band nothing more than a boy-band in pop-punk clothing. They sing about Myspace and there are token ballads aplenty, and while some of the songs have fast drumming and meaty riffs (‘The Unicorn Revolt’) it’s not convincing enough to be anything more than a contrived attempt to cash in with the tweenyboppers.
Whenever the band up the pace they sound passable, although this is as sickly sweet a pop-punk CD as I’ve ever heard. The production is so sugary it is liable to rot your teeth. There are singalong moments though – ‘More Than A Revolution’ has a huge hook and ‘Anti-Adieu’ sounds like New Found Glory – so it’s not a complete deadloss, but this is far too close to the pop end of the scale to make any kind of lasting impression. I wouldn’t be surprised if the band showed up on MTV to become one hit wonders, but Eleventyseven make Good Charlotte look and sound like a hardcore band. ‘Nuff said.
www.eleventysevenrock.com
Flicker Records
paul