It wasn't long ago that a bushy eyebrowed, full-sleeved tattoo sportin' Christian by the name of Chris Carrabba left his rock band, Further Seems Forever, to embark on nearly overnight emo superstardom under the guise of Dashboard Confessional. About that same time, I gave up on emo. I saw it become a marketing scheme to sell boring records to lackluster children whining about how their life sucks on LiveJournal. Emo died the moment Carrabba started writing songs about hair being everywhere and kissing girls in the rain.
Secondhand Serenade is the vehicle that John Vesely uses to write songs about love and more songs about love on top of more songs about love. Awake is so syrupy sweet that it leaves a sick feeling in your bowels as you try and stomach through the twelve acoustic tracks. I hate acoustic songs. I hate it when bands go unplugged. I surely am not a fan of some douchebag from California with perfect hair strumming the six strings and caterwauling such pathetic diatribes about relationships and dating that even The O.C. would leave his songs off their soundtracks.
Mr. Vesely has a Mrs. Vesely in his life and I can only assume when he's singing about sharing the blankets with her and the reason that he was born was to tell her that he loves her. I wish I were making this stuff up. Sure these songs would have been a great wedding present and been done with it. Nevertheless, the rest of us have to listen to guy prattle on about his "amazing wife" because he happened to get a record deal with a label that has a distribution deal through East West.
John Vesely sounds just like Chris Carrabba. If you played Awake to anyone they would probably ask you if Dashboard Confessional is a one-piece again. Then they would ask you why you are listening to it in the first place since you aren't Mrs. Lesley or a 14-year-old girl who's a little lonely tonight. I can't even make it halfway through this CD and I always try my best to listen to an album all the way through at least once. I just can't get past all the hackneyed bullshit this dude keeps spilling out. Fuck, I just heard the phrase, "Tears like razorblades." Is John seriously thinking that a reviewer would actually hear that line and think, "wow, man, that's deep"?
If you are fan of early non-jacked in Dashboard Confessional and need yet another comely lad to sing you songs about being together forever and hearts breaking then by all means check out Awake. However for the rest of us out there that actually like music, avoid this like the plague.
