Justin Sane

Life, Love, and the Pursuit of Justice (2002)

Ryan

Whoever said this was gonna be a bad year for music was wrong because there are some exeptional cds coming out like Dillinger Four's "Situationist Comedy," and Strung Out's "American Peridox." The list goes on, but on the other hand there are big explosions for pop bands such as Something Corporate or Dashboard Confessional. Is there anything that can please everyone.

I'll be to the point, this record was a very solid and refreshing release for Justin who is the vocalist for the loved/hated Anti-Flag. Its a disc containing 13 tracks of Justin's amazing beautiful yet raw vocal abilities. This record is full of angry vocals and the single guitar that is being played which makes this much more enjoyable that Dashboards polished sound. Somtimes he bust out the acoustic guitar in songs such as, "61C Days Turned To Nights," and "Cassette Deck, Road Trip, Grand Canyon" which come out very nice.

As for lyrics don't expect the ol political Anti-Flag songwriting. Songs about life and hard times growing up is what mostly fills this record up. Sometimes though it can get old like in "If Its Good For The Economy, Im For It" which can get annoying when Jusin recites the same lyrics over and over.

"If genocide is good for the economy then I am for it, if genocide is bad for the economy then I'm against it." He does this with different subjects and it leads to skipping this track. Sometimes the lyrics do seem to drag as if he is making them up as he goes along. This only happens a little bit so it doesn't really take away from the overall effect.

If your expecting another Anti-Flag then your not gonna get it. Its nice to see some emotion in Justins voice but still has that "yelling out" trait that he carries in Anti-Flag. This probably will not make it in my top ten list this year for cds, but this is worth the money to check it out. Its too bad Dashboard Confessional is getting so much respect when cds like this are so much better.