I can honestly say that this type of music is not really my cup of tea. As much as I pride myself for having diverse tastes, just about every pop punk or emo band I’ve heard since the early 90’s goes in one ear and out the other. “Let It Roll” would fall into generic trappings if it were not for a couple of saving graces. For one thing vocalist/guitarist Danny Black’s voice has some depth to it as he avoids whining altogether. It’s obvious that he knows that manner of noise annoys. The thickness to his voice very much reminds me of Russ Rogers from THE NUMB ONES (Cleopatra recording artists and one of my favorites from South Florida). Another thing that keeps them from becoming total ignorable wheeze is that they actually show a little diversity. Not every song sounds the same and that’s a welcome change.

The opening track “Something You Really Oughta Know” sets the proceeding off to a pleasant start. The mood is temporarily stalled with Black’s horrible fake English accent in “Seems Like”. Seems like this would have been much better had he sang it like the rest of what’s here. “Rock n Roll Is Dead” demonstrates his ability at writing quality lyrics tenfold. Every composition’s lyrics are printed here and most of it is pretty choice. The mostly acoustic “Quit Your Hardcore Band (While You Still Can)” is quite catchy in a good way. It is followed by equally appealing “Eat Your Heart Out”. If this were a vinyl record I would say that side two is better than side one. MTF kick it up a notch even if they seem to really abuse the emo octaves in the guitar department. “So Far Away” contains what appears to be sort of a latter day REPLACEMENTS influence. Like the rest of this disc, it possesses some of the same passion the latest CD by THE ALARM displays. Not quite that good, but close enough for rock n roll.

- Herring

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