Now this band is indeed far from having any individuality but they have potential. Hailing from the unglamorous town of Paderborn they play emo pop with some good guitar leads and a singer who is blessed with an expressive voice. Without the singer the band wouldn’t even be have as good in fact.

However the lyrics are totally lame. Even Tokio Hotel have more to say. Eight out of ten songs address some lyrical “you” in interpersonal things and two are about a lyrical “I” being happy to be free from some lyrical “you”. All this happens on a solid high school cliché level and every song title (I’d take any bet!) has already been used at least once by a band or an artist not completely unknown. Okay, let’s see:

“what’s new” – Frank Sinatra
“too blind” – Sub7even
“silence” – Sarah McLachlan
“still alive” – The Crash
“breathe” – The Prodigy
“like a bad day” - ???
“the torture” – Shakira
“can’t deny” – Alanis Morissette
“wait in suspense” - ???
“faked” - ???

Hey, that makes seven out of ten after only ten minutes google research. Pretty good, uh?

And what is the deal with the picture in the centrefold of the booklet? Hasn’t there already been a record cover like this or something? Oh, and the lyrics are printed way too small. I got glasses but many people would have problems with them I guess. Anyway, this record is pretty okay. In a genre of rubbish that’s not too hard after all. Among the blind the one-eyed is king. Speaking of Mellory, does anyone know that parlour game “smellory”? That’s a bullshit game and it stinks like cheap perfume over and over. In some way Mellory smells like cheap perfume as well. It does its job but it isn’t the real deal. For anyone who has ever listened to Turbostaat or Jawbreaker or any other emotional hc/punk band that has IT this band got nothing to offer. However for all the twelve year old kids out there this might be quite an alternative to Christina Stürmer or Killerpilze. It’s a bit like One Fine Day in a little better.  [jan]

www.mellory.de