I keep making news posts raving about how amazing Say Anything’s album In Defense of the Genre is, so I decided to write a review to break its amazingness down into the form of a few paragraphs. Let me first start off by saying that I was very bitter about Say Anything when I initially started listening to this album. I thought, “Oh great, another album with songs like ‘Admit It’ where a bunch of girls and boys on Myspace quote the entire song like they made some sort of substantial musical discovery and therefore feel the need to paste the lyrics onto their profiles,” in those words exactly. However, I was pleasantly surprised after listening to a few tracks. Although frontman Max Bremis’s vocals are still very dominant and as pronounced as they were in …Is a Real Boy, the band definitely redefines “innovative” this time around.



In Defense of the Genre is a two-disc set comprised of a whopping 27 tracks; but this does not by any means compromise the integrity of each individual song. This album also features 23 different artists and musicians, including: Hayley Williams of Paramore, Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance, Aaron Gillespie of Underoath/The Almost, Chris Conley of Saves the Day, and many other noteworthy artists. Max Bemis’s prominent vocals pair perfectly with every featured guest. Whether this is a product of a good producer or pure coincidence is a little unclear… The first time I listened to The Church Channel I thought Hayley Williams was a boy, but maybe that’s because I’m used to boys sounding like girls now… Who knows?



The concept of the entire album is clearly a musical eulogy to Bemis’s personal issues. The Church Channel begins with the line “I wake up in a room and realize I’m insane again / This is the fifth time straight in a year I’ve ended up in here…” and in Sorry, Dudes My Bad there is a line where a band mate is trying to sell Bemis “this Xanax for five dollars.” I guess the bright side of all of these personal issues is that the outcome is 27 songs of lyrical genius, but what happens when it’s time to write another album? Hopefully there are no more trips to the insane asylum for Max Bemis, but by the looks of it I should probably hold my tongue. My only advice? Take your meds!