Audience Of One

I Remember When All This Meant Something (1999)

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Where do I begin with this? Audience of One is former Saosin frontman Anthony Green's first band. Essentially a three-piece of barely-outta-high school Philadelphians, they managed to put together a very diverse album. They switch seamlessly between smooth songs such as opener "Show Your Teeth" to the more gut-wrenching, minute-and-a-half long "The Icarus Ambition" almost as well as Green transitions between his singing and screaming. The latter does indeed strongly dominate the album.

As always, his lyrics are nearly indecipherable, but that was always a part of his charm. The lyrics you can hear from him remain cryptic, seemingly devoid of meaning to anyone but him or the most analytical of listeners.

The one problem I do have with this release is not the poor production values (Zolof The Rock & Roll Destroyer's guitarist Vince Ratti took the seat) as it gives it a sense of character and rawness that makes this CD feel like it was made in the early 90s as opposed to 1999.

Another problem is that none of the songs really stand out too well, save a couple of tracks, such as the final song (before the hidden track) "Saosin" which has Anthony basically singing "to be honest I'd really like to, but I know that it'd hurt you and I can't" and screaming "your smile, it breaks my heart" which could be an example of poor, cliché lyricism if it weren't for the intensity and passion with which he sings it, giving it an authentic sense of emotion most bands could only dream of achieving.

So in the end, if you're looking for a semi-new band that could give such classic "screamo" bands like Saetia, Orchid, or Antioch Arrow a run for their money, buy this. Plus you'll get to see where Circa Survive frontman Anthony Green got his start and how he's changed through the years.