$2 OUT THE DOOR

I completely dismissed this band based solely on their ridiculous name (for my foreign friends, the phrase "$2 Out The Door" is found on 40 ounce bottles of cheap malt liquor in stores in the poorer neighborhoods of the US...just another way for The Man to keep you down), but it seems that poor decision making in the band name department doesn't translate into poor music making in the rock and roll department - quite the contrary. These kids are from my neighborhood (shit, I might even be friends with them, I wouldn't know because I thought their name was stupid and I never went to see them, even when they played three blocks from my house, so if we are pals, them I'm sorry I made fun of your band's name), and create a ruckus that appeals to the same part of my brain that digs MINUTEMEN, while reminding me inexplicably of THE VSS. Bass and drums often just provide the background for the soaring vocals, but when the music steps to the foreground and you let these songs sink in....well, suffice to say that I shouldn't have dismissed them based solely on their name. It sounds like some miscreants just accidentally made some hipster music for the rest of us to like, without all the expensive clothes.

COINTELBROS