Review: Blue Sky Goodbye

Blue Sky Goodbye
“Look on the Bright Side”
(Uprising Music)

“Sad Bastard Music” is a great name for a stripped down, acoustic emo song.  It’s from “High Fidelity”, when Barry accuses Rob of listening to “sad bastard music” after Rob breaks up with his girlfriend.  As far as Blue Sky Goodbye goes, “Sad Bastard Music” is the closing track to a pretty good album, full of hooks and the ubiquitous Get Up Kids influences.  But really, who doesn’t sound like the Get Up Kids?

BSG also shares a few musical similarities with The Alkaline Trio, except BSG’s singer Reid Crandall’s voice has more of a Mike Ness sandpaper quality, rather than the subtle perfectness of Matt Skiba.  In any case, “Look on the Bright Side” covers much of the same emopunk ground that so many others have traversed, heart on sleeve on tracks like, “Highsight is 20/20”, “Friday Night Support Group”, and “Autumn Bloom”.  To their credit, BSG never resort to simple platitudes and generic whininess, instead writing winning lines like, “There’s nobody out there just like me”, and “You’re nobody’s favorite but you say you’ll find the one”.  There’s plenty to like here and enough to keep you coming back for more, you sad bastard you.