Day 10, Polaris - Music from the Adventure of Pete and Pete

Polaris came to me on a bad day. Music from the Adventure of Pete and Pete should put a smile on my face, but I was suffering from a brutal allergy attack. I’ve never gotten serious allergies before, so I was convinced I had been poisoned. Turns out Clariton fixes poisonings. This actually happened on Wednesday, but I couldn’t half ass this one, so I put off writing the review and revisiting it until today.

It may simply be because of my nostalgic love for this album’s correlated television show, but I felt determined to really enjoy it. I had “Hey Sandy,” the first track on this album and coincidentally the song featured in the Pete and Pete opening credits, on my Ipod for years and it often found its way onto my playlists. Though I found that this album is much more than one hit, it didn’t quite live up to be the gem I had hoped it to be.

Polaris, and more notably their real band called Miracle Legion, and other bands like R.E.M. defined the “low-fi” movement out of the early nineties. Music from the Adventures of Pete and Pete is no exception. It is all basic rock songs with bass, drums and two guitars that sound thin and coated with a light layer of that classic 1990’s chorus effect. The album seems to sound like it was recorded in somebody’s basement with a 6 track. The parts are tastelessly washed with reverb, but this is what it’s all about. It is so rock-and-roll, even though there is not a single heavy drum fill, no blazin’ guitar solos, and no fat distortion. This raw-ness carries the album because it makes you forgive the out of tune vocals and poorly mixed guitars.

And the songs are pretty good, too. Lyrically, you’re not going to be blown away by anything here—we’re not hanging out with Bright Eyes anymore. And to be honest, it is very refreshing. “She is Staggering” and “Everywhere” are both honest, relatable love songs—as if you were having a conversation with your buddy. Literally. The first lines from “She is Staggering” are “Are you crazy, man? You didn’t notice her?”

But I get the most pleasure from their up-tempo songs. “The Monster’s Loose,” “Waiting for October,” “Saturnine,” and of course “Hey Sandy” bring that child-like playfulness that is not only inherent in their image, but in their garage-band sound and their honest-to-god lyrics. But when it is all said and done, the nostalgia I have for “Hey Sandy” and the TV show sets it up for failure. Nothing is ever as good as you remember it.