I would imagine going to a Starting Line concert would be downing a few two many cheap beers at a party. You have a good time enjoying the youthful enthusiasm, and energy of the band, but you wake up the morning after, look yourself in the mirror, vomit, then ask yourself what the f*** was I thinking. When I first picked up 'Say It Like You Mean It' I thought I found a treasure. TSL were relatively unknown at the time (for a drive-thru band) and I could have been found bouncing around my bedroom with my headphones blasting the poppy goodness of songs like 'Best of Me' or 'Cheek to Cheek.' Life was good it was the springtime and I had a new band to throw myself into. Unfortunately, by the summer I began to hit the wall. The overproduced pop sound began to iritate me. The vocal patterns began to to blend together and the guitars started to sound uninspired and boring. I call this the 'Drive-Thru Effect.' Apparently the rest of the scene was experiencing the same thing, and reports came flying in that 12yr old girls were flooding thier shows. (so much for the beer analogy) But it isn't all bad now with The Starting Line. In retrospect, the album wouldn't seem so bad now if I didn't overlisten to it. After all I have to give them credit since they are practically straight out of high school. But I still await their next album to answer one lingering question I still have. Will TSL's next work be less deserving of analogies cheap beer and warrant of comparisons to a fine wine that gets better with age? Top Track - Cheek to Cheek
