My Sister Ocean – Beautiful Failures

This CD gave me bad vibes from the get go: the lame band name, the dodgy cover art, the two dudes (and I mean, dudes). For about five seconds, I thought I was listening to the first wave of Death From Above 1979 imitators, but my hopes were soon dashed as this bass/drum/etc. duo from Edmonton quickly sunk into the mire of generic alt-rock radio nonsense. They’re not even smart enough to put their contact info on the CD so I had to google them and, in an effort to find something redeeming (see, I do my research), clicked a link to an article on the singer’s favourite album. It is Ten by Pearl Jam – the most radio ready, generic, untroubled and uninteresting of the original Seattle grunge cohort. Case closed. (Terence Dick)

CD, www.mysisterocean.com