Piper's Single Reviews: Issue 4

This is the fourth installment of Piper's Single Reviews. Each post, I will review six songs by various indie and/or alternative bands (or artists that you might chance upon when listening to an American college or modern rock station) and rate them on a scale from 1 to 10. Sorry about the delay, I usually do this on Fridays, but something came up.

Animal Collective - My Girls
This is the first single from Animal Collective's excellent new album Merriweather Post Pavilion. It is the sex. That is all.
10/10

Kasabian - Vlad the Impaler
Kasabian are known as one of the few bands still making music in the "alternative dance" genre that Big Audio Dynamite once ruled in the late 80s and early 90s. "Vlad the Impaler" is the preview track (not the first single, although it is certainly singleworthy) from their upcoming Dan "The Automator" Nakamura-produced third record The West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum and is just as anthemic as "Club Foot" or "Empire". It's a good song, but I have a feeling it could be the starting point for some great dance floor filling remixes.
8.5/10

Passion Pit - The Reeling
Coming off the internet buzz of their 2008 EP Chunk of Change and its single "Sleepyhead", The Passion Pit have released "The Reeling", the first single from their new album Manners. It's probably the most 1980s sounding song that has been released in the past few which is quite a feat to say the least. It's got a nice beat and good chorus and actually managed to be infinitely better than "Sleepyhead". This is probably one of the finest songs of the year right here.
9.5/10

Green Day - Know Your Enemy
Who would've thought that Green Day, of all bands would wind up being one of the most popular alternative rock bands again? The band's first wave of popularity was between 1994 and 1996 with their wonderful third album Dookie and the harder Insomniac. Their next two albums - nimrod. and Warning: featured a few good songs (OK, two a piece: "Hitchin' A Ride" and "Macy's Day Parade", respectively) but were otherwise middling. Then in 2004, the band released another middling album, American Idiot (again, it featured one good song - the nine minute "Jesus of Suburbia"), but it managed to become their second breakthrough spinning off their biggest hits since nimrod.'s "Time of Your Life". Now they're back with a new single called "Know Your Enemy" - the first single from their upcoming eighth album 21st Century Breakdown. It's not very good. In fact, it's instrumentation sounds a bit too much like Bad Religion's 1994 hit "Infected". The lyrics are forgettable, you'll know that the words "know your enemy" are sung ad nauseum but you're not sure how or when a few hours after listening. Such is the laziness of the songwriting of Billie Joe Armstrong. But no what I or any other critic says, it's going to be a hit anyway. You will eventually remember how the song goes after the four zillionth time you hear it on the radio this year.
5.5/10

Camera Obscura - French Navy
"French Navy" is the new single from My Maudlin Career, the fourth album by unsmiling twee pop outfit Camera Obscura. Like most CO songs, its all about the vocals of leader/guitarist Tracyanne Campbell, who sounds like a cross between a member of a 60's girl group and Amelia Fletcher of twee pop heroes Heavenly. "French Navy" is probably the band's best single since "Lloyd, I'm Ready to Be Heartbroken", and even without a strong chorus it manages to be extremely catchy
8.5/10

Blue October - Dirt Room
Blue October's 2006 pop and rock radio hit "Hate Me" brought the long-running Texas rock group into the national spotlight for the first time in their eleven year career. Foiled, the album featuring "Hate Me" and its followup rock radio hit, the divine "Into the Ocean" was one of the best rock albums to go platinum that year. The band follows up that record with their highly anticipated fifth album Approaching Normal. The first single "Dirt Room", sadly, does not live up to the hype that was expected. Its a revenge song about the narrator kidnapping someone who really, really pissed him off. The song is cursed with bad lyrics and an embarrassingly terrible second verse. It seems to serve the purpose of showing fair-weather fans of the band's two big singles that Blue October can rock hard. Unfortunately, Blue October kinda sucks when they rock hard (they do some good up tempo songs, though). There's better choices for a first single on Approaching Normal ("Say It", anyone?) than this stumbling block.
5/10