DISC 1:

01. We Are The Foolish 3:35
02. Ever So Shy 3:24
03. Please Take Your Time 3:13
04. Buildings 6:08
05. I'm Not Made Of Eyes 3:21
06. Sinking Ships 3:06
07. Rebel Get By 3:20
08. Talk To My Friends 3:23
09. Dancing With Girls 3:04
10. First Impressions 3:54

DISC 2:

01. Sinking Ships (Acoustic) 2:37
02. We Are The Foolish (Acoustic) 3:26
03. Ever So Shy (Acoustic) 2:47
04. I'm Not Made Of Eyes (Acoustic) 3:35

01. You've Got It All Wrong 5:56
02. We're On Our Own 6:55
03. When You Realise 5:16
04. Hearts & Minds 6:56
05. Don't Look Down 5:11
06. Forgiveness 6:45
07. Reference 5:59
08. With Angels 5:17
09. Atone 5:52
10. Recovery 5:12
11. Serenity 5:04

01. Are We? Will We? 3:22
02. Issinair 3:07
03. Cutt Me Off 2:36
04. An Apparition 3:06
05. Dust 3:34
06. Less Talk 4:05
07. Lydia 2:49
08. Upstart 3:35
09. Family Ties 3:26
10. Nightmarer 2:45
11. I'm American 2:10
12. Danger Kids 4:07

01 - How Are You Now?
02 - Come And Go
03 - Cookies
04 - Lovers Are In Trouble
05 - I'm Sorry
06 - Go On
07 - Victoria Indie Queen
08 - Rockstars And Cigarettes
09 - Driving All Night Long
10 - Mr. Confusion
11 - The Napkin Song
12 - All I Need
13 - I Was Born In The 80's

01 - Getaway
02 - Forever
03 - Southern Skies

1. You're the Reason Why I'm Afraid to Die
2. I'm Sorry But I'm Beginning to Hate Your Face
3. You Can't Call Yourself a Secret
4. I Don't Know If People Have Hated Me, But I Have Hated People
5. I Don't Know If This Is Ignorance or Transcendence
6. The Year of the How To Book
7. The Boy With a Serpent In His Heart
8. Twenty Thousand Light Years
9. We Move Like Turtles Might
10. I Don't Believe In Wars But I Do Believe In Uniforms
11. The Coming of the Plague
12. Thanks to All
13. You're the Reason Why I'm Afraid to Die (Acoustic Version)
14. The Coming of the Plague (Acoustic Version)

One of the tactics that we develop as teenagers is the ability, triggered by wanting to grow up and get out way too fast, to render somewhat ordinary feelings in overwrought terms. Andy Hull, the barely-able-to-legally drink driving force behind Manchester Orchestra, is one such kid. He formed the band in the Atlanta suburbs in his junior year of high school, and the resultant album titles signal his desire to transcend his youth with verbiage: There's the purposefully paradoxical, mildly shocking, and certainly cheesy I'm Like a Virgin Losing a Child, or the 2005 EP You Brainstorm, I Brainstorm, But Brilliance Needs a Good Editor (apparently, album titles are excluded from said editing). Mean Everything to Nothing, the title of the band's latest and best-yet effort, tamps down the dramatics in favor of a pithy phrase drawn from the Young Existentialist's Handbook.

The emotions on Everything still run incredibly high, but the music has gotten much buffer, due no doubt to the band's relentless touring schedule over the past few years. The shift also owes something to the able hand of producer Joe Chiccarelli, who made the Shins sound arena-sized on Wincing the Night Away and manned the wayward ship of My Morning Jacket's Evil Urges, which for all of its ill-considered moves, still at least sounded great. In one interview last year, Hull called Everything "Pinkerton on steroids," and while the latter is certainly true, opening track "The Only One" makes Manchester Orchestra sound a lot more like "Kings of Leon's younger brothers." Like the Followill clan, Southern signifiers are packed tight amidst beefy riffs, with Hull's plaint that "I'm the only son of a pastor I know who does the things I do" substituting youthful angst for the brazen groupie-fucking of the Kings, themselves sons of a preacher man.

"The Only One" opens a solidly rocking first half of Everything, on which the band builds a blazing bulwark of stadium-sized redneck-dread. On "Shake It Out", Hull's lyrics-- voiced in a half-shouted/half-sung timbre that should sound exceedingly familiar by now-- ride a dual-exhaust punk riff to a chorus that just barely stops itself from diving headfirst into hillbilly territory. The title "I've Got Friends" nods backward to No Fences, but Hull is far from sweeping onstage via zipline, wireless mic strapped to his head. On "You, My Pride & Me", the band does an end-around the past 15+ years of emotionally-driven punk and plops down right in grunge territory. Hull may have been three when Bleach dropped, but his voice distantly channels a young and angry Kurt Cobain, and atop a dirge-like Black Sabbath cop to boot. When that monster riff hits, damn if I didn't yearn to pull out my nearly unplayable-for-a-decade-plus-of-scratches copies of Alice in Chains' Facelift and Dirt.

And that's a good thing. Hull may claim in interviews that Weezer and Neutral Milk Hotel (yes, you read that correctly) are major influences on his songwriting, but Everything works best in a Paleolithic rock register, instead of aiming for emo-trained ears. "One Hundred Dollars" attempts to merge Conor Oberst with Barrett Strong's "Money (That's What I Want)", and it's predictably awkward, and thankfully brief. It leads to a second half of Everything on which Hull is still high-strung, but his confusion is consistently tempered by varying degrees of revelation. On the midtempo ballad "My Friend Marcus", Hull tells the story of a friend who lives in his basement because "his father touched more than spirit," while on the title track, he confesses, again in the convoluted, Yoda-esque register of a confused, bright kid, that "Definitely, not the things that I'm seeing, did I think I'd see so instantly." Phew-- for a kid barely able to legally drink, Hull's got the exhaustion of middle age. And that's the thing that both defines Manchester Orchestra at this point, as well as what stops them from being great. When they're satisfied with rocking the fuck out, they do it exceedingly well, but when they try to acquire the adult answers, they'd do well to chill out and enjoy being young.

1. "The Only One" - 2:39
2. "Shake it Out" - 5:11
3. "I've Got Friends" - 4:57
4. "Pride" - 5:47
5. "In My Teeth" - 4:42
6. "100 Dollars" - 1:50
7. "I Can Feel a Hot One" - 4:19
8. "My Friend Marcus" - 3:41
9. "Tony The Tiger" - 3:09
10. "Everything To Nothing" - 5:37
11. "The River" - 11:33

On the opening track of this Atlanta quintet's first full-length, the acidic washes of the Verve's less commercial songs meld with the whiney inflections of, say, Placebo's Brian Molko. The guitars eventually move toward the falsely epic Edge of reason (the lick is virtually lifted from U2's "New Year's Day") before mechanical strums change tack again, pulling the potential of all this inattentive variety into a heap of head-tossing joy, more hapless crux of overwritten Dandy Warhol song than prologue track of festival-gracing rock newcomer. Andy Hull, the singer, lends the dullest songs an attitude; sometimes that attitude is simply warmth, other times it's an ornery kind of emotional outpouring. But when the better songs succeed, they leave the singer in the dust, his vocal twists and turns a cacophony among the seamless, inventive components of guitar, keyboard, drum, and bass, particularly noticeable on "Now That You're Home".

Much of the album has a road-bound, breezy, wistful tone, well-produced on the band's own label by Dan Hannon. On "I Can Barely Breathe", the sea-like gurgles of the guitar meld with car window-gazing plucks, and the torrid yelps of the chorus take us back to another moment of the 1990s, the almost furry thickness of guitars in songs by bands like Weezer and Toadies. The song's devolution is welcome; it's an impenetrably sad loop of descending chords mimicked in every instrument, and while there's nothing complex or entirely innovative about it, it's moving all the same.

The effect is similar to that of the candid lyrics of "Sleeper 1972", which recounts the most biological and vapid parts of death and their repercussions on the living. Accompanied only by an organ, Hull's voice takes on a sweet, hushed quality, and on this track the comparison to Ben Gibbard starts to make sense. Who else is able to discuss the morbid with such sugar in his voice?

The subjects here, musically grungy and convincingly adolescent, are, verbally speaking, full of references to childhood, family, relationships, desire, and sympathy. In "I Can Feel Your Pain", Hull sings into the microphone like it's a voicemail we're not really supposed to hear. But we become stand-ins for a distant addressee who might have never heard the message. While this personal bit of memorabilia, acoustic and nicely undercooked, is lovely, like many of the other tracks, it achieves this via atmosphere, with nebulous ideas rather than a riveting melody or story. And "Pain" is so different from the rest that it feels like a mere interlude. By contrast, the vocal synths on "Where Have You Been" help make the song sound majestic, so perhaps it's commendable that Hull can direct songs that are both miniscule and mountainous in volume, and can achieve the same emotive weight in either case.

1. "Wolves at Night" — 4:05
2. "Now That You're Home" — 3:08
3. "The Neighborhood Is Bleeding" — 2:49
4. "I Can Feel Your Pain" — 2:52
5. "Where Have You Been?" — 6:15
6. "I Can Barely Breathe" — 5:01
7. "Sleeper 1972" — 4:08
8. "Golden Ticket" — 3:31
9. "Alice and Interiors" — 4:19
10. "Don't Let Them See You Cry" — 1:45
11. "Colly Strings" — 5:59

When I first caught Atlanta's Manchester Orchestra a few years back, I was instantly hooked but could never have foreseen the band's meteoric rise which has included performances on the Late Show with David Letterman and Late Night with Conan O'Brien. With Andy Hull's always-disarming lyrics at the foundation of their melodic indie rock, Manchester Orchestra is set to release Mean Everything To Nothing on April 21st. The album's production responsibilities go to Joe Chicarrelli, who has helmed releases from The Shins and My Morning Jacket. Sounds promising. Back in 2005, the then-unknown young band recorded an album entitled Nobody Sings Anymore, which was never released due to the band's shift in musical direction and lineup changes. While a handful of the tracks were included on the band's EP You Brainstorm, I Brainstorm, But Brilliance Needs A Good Editor, the remainder of the songs remain shelved for possible future release. Here's a couple of them.

1. "Golden Ticket" — 3:31
2. "Window" — 2:21
3. "The Procession" — 3:28
4. "I'd Rather Have" — 4:34
5. "She Found a Love" — 5:25
6. "Anything Left" — 3:26
7. "The Other Side" — 3:17
8. "Please Don't Go" — 2:56
9. "Girl with Broken Wings" — 6:39
10. "Slow to Learn" — 2:47
11. "La-Di-Da" — 4:29

Envy on the Coast have added a new song titled "The Devil's Tongue" to their MySpace. According to an accompanying blog, "This recording of “The Devil’s Tongue” is the first sneak peak from our upcoming full length album Lowcountry, which will be released in early 2010."

1. Death March On Two, Ready?
2. The Devil's Tongue
3. Headfirst In The River
4. Puritan Dirt Song
5. Laugh Ourselves To Death
6. The Great American T-Shirt Racket
7. Southern Comfort
8. *
9. Like I Do
10. Numb
11. Made Of Stone
12. Clean Of You

All I say is I like the way AWK, our rock & roll party hero, is musically evolving. Yes, there are traces of his earlier work here, but Andrew (not Andy, haha) seems not content to repeat himself...and based on this new record, I say "The Wolf" is a bridge between "I Get Wet" and "Close Calls With Brick Walls". Dare I say, this new one is a concept record of sorts that tells a story, with a beginning, middle and end. There is a wide gamut of material here, from piano-pounding rockers like the catchy "I Want To See You Go Wild" and "The Background"; typical-but-not-typical AWK barnstormers like "Not Going To Bed", the amazing "Hand On The Place" and the dare-I say-it-Meatloaf-ish "You Will Remember Tonight"; short interludes like "Golden Eyed Dog", the sorta title-track "Close Calls With Bal Harbour", and "Dr. Dumont"; and rockers with a twist "Slam John Against A Brick Wall" (which basically repeats itself but speeds up as it goes along, to cool effect), "The Moving Room", "Don't Call Me Andy" and "Las Vegas, Nevada". He is also, dare I say it, actually SINGING (really well too), not so much tunefully shouting like your mechanic in the garage down the block!!!

AND, on the Korean edition, there are FOUR MORE bonus tracks, making the tracklist number a grand total of 22, and these 4 tunes are among the best songs on the album: "Can You Dance With Me??" (everyone should say yes), "This Is My World", "I Want Your Face", and the amazing "Let's Go On A Date" (which everyone should play for someone they like). The length of the album is still short, as it has short interludes...with the 4 bonuses, the total length is 57 minutes and change, which is a bit short but it's a full meal when you think of the big dose of innovative rock & roll you're getting by our hero Andrew W.K. Everyone should hear the brilliance he's putting out...and 2 more albums in 2007...in a way, he's as much of an auteur as Brian Wilson, in his own way.

I have no idea what stuff is on the bonus DVD on the Japanese pressing, but these 4 tunes more make up for it. Go Andrew!!!!

DISC 1:

01. I Came For You 2:16
02. Close Calls With Bal Harbour 1:22
03. Not Going To Bed 2:57
04. You Will Remember Tonight 4:06
05. Pushing Drugs 2:41
06. Hand On The Place 3:20
07. One Brother 2:25
08. Las Vegas, Nevada 3:00
09. Dr. Dumont 1:06
10. I Want To See You Go Wild 3:00
11. When I'm High 3:16
12. Golden Eyed Dog 0:28
13. Into The Clear 1:33
14. Mark My Grace 3:11
15. Don't Call Me Andy 2:45
16. The Background 2:55
17. Slam John Against A Brick Wall 3:52
18. The Moving Room 3:37

DISC 2:

01. We Party (You Shout) 2:40
02. High Five 3:31
03. Let's Go On A Date 2:19
04. We Got A Groove 5:13
05. Sarah Notto 2:06
06. I'm A Vagabond 2:42
07. I've Got Know Fear 3:26
08. Big Party 2:45
09. Who Knows 2:22
10. Coming Bad 4:12
11. Can You Dance With Me 2:08
12. Kicks And Bricks 2:58
13. A.W.K. 5:44
14. I Will Find God 3:41
15. This Is My World 2:46
16. Young Lord 2:59
17. We're Not Gunna Get Old 4:50
18. Kill Yourself 3:16
19. I Want Your Face 2:25
20. Jewel Street Man 4:43
21. The Party God 2:14